


Irrecoverable

by Belfire



Series: The Calm, The Storm, The Shockwave [1]
Category: Batman - Fandom, Red Hood and the Outlaws (Comics), red hood and arsenal
Genre: Brainwashing, Crowbars, Dark fic, Despressing af, Don't Read This, Force Choking, Hallucinations, Jason needs hugs and kisses, M/M, Mental Breakdown, Non-Consensual Somnophilia, Please Kill Me, Psychological Torture, Roman Sionis is basically satan, Someone loses an arm, Temporary Blindness, Things you cannot unsee, Torture, Trigger words, Trust Issues, don't read if you're easily disturbed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-29
Updated: 2018-09-23
Packaged: 2019-05-15 11:22:02
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 21
Words: 101,153
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14789568
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Belfire/pseuds/Belfire
Summary: Jason Todd has tried to balance his life with Roy as well as being undercover with Gotham's most notorious criminal kingpin, and snapping is inevitable. He thinks he's already lost everything, but of course he made that assumption when he still had his will and his sanity, and there is still many things to lose." Don't scream, baby, don't scream. It'll all be over soon."Jason wanted to fight to get out of Sionis' lap when his whole world was met with a searing slice of pain and he caught a glimpse of the silvery blade of his knife sailing through his stomach with a spray of blood.He screamed against Sionis' hand and thrashed but the blade came again and again and continued to do so until everything was sinking into a familiar black haze. He tried to fight it back but he knew there was no winning, not then and not now.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Nance](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Nance/gifts).



> Now that I am an older, wiser person, I fucking hate this story. Every bit of it. There are plotholes and lack of consistency in characters, so be ready for that.

Like every other morning, Jason woke from an unnaturally induced slumber on the floor of Sionis' bedroom, and like every other morning, the bruises and now possibly broken ribs stung like hell, not to mention the throbbing headache going off like a war gong against his skull. He wanted to but couldn't get up, it was like he was paralysed or someone had parked an anvil on him, or the experimental drug Sionis stabbed into him last night was still in effect.

Speaking of the devil, Roman Sionis walked in at some point and said something to him that Jason didn't take note of. In what was also more common than not, he felt his weight gathered off the floor and placed back on the bed, where Sionis got his morning rocks off by stripping and fucking him. Jason said and did nothing, just breathed through the pain and the hand grabbing his hair to keep him in submission, although he might have really liked to be somewhere else. He began thinking about and then imagining waking up to Alfred's wonderful breakfast and Bruce's rare smiles instead of these sessions of abuse. But as quickly as the beautiful mental image formed it was taken away by a particularly hard yank of his hair or jolt to his body.

When Sionis was done he didn't say anything to Jason, just got redressed and left with the doors slamming dramatically behind him. Jason remained on the bed for a few minutes, hugging his drawn knees as he stared absently into space. This time every morning he couldn't stop himself from thinking how ashamed Bruce would be if he knew that he was whoring himself out for sake of the mission, or at least, he told himself it was for that but he may have lost sight of the goal. Bring down Black Mask's drug empire.... bring down Mask's drug empire... fuck, he didn't even know how he was doing that anymore, only that that's the idea he'd had when he started this. Jason wasn't exactly certain when everything had gone so off course, which meant he also did not know how to steer it back.

Some time passed before he got up and resumed the painstaking morning routine; he had a long hot shower but didn't feel the sizzling water on his skin, got dressed in front of the steamed up bathroom mirror and tried to ignore the bruises that covered him and crescent imprints on his hips, and finished by marching straight up to Sionis' office to receive his orders for the day and what those might be, Jason cared not to imagine for they varied.

Sionis was at his desk, going through charts regarding the month's black market income and holding a glass of whiskey despite the early hours. He didn't look up when Jason came in and left him to wait until he had completed the paperwork. Once he was done he tore his eyes from the schematics begrudgingly and stared at the younger man with flickers of loathing in his ruby eyes. He didn't like to look at Jason face-to-face.

" Orders, sir?" Jason asked, standing dutifully by with his hands behind his back and his feet in a wide stance. He preferred to look bigger when talking to his boss.

" Want to kneel under my desk and suck my cock while I work?" Sionis grunted the suggestion as he shuffled the papers and tapped the edge against the table to straighten them out.

Jason swallowed, throat bobbing as he did. " Is that an order, sir?" Good lord, he hoped it wasn't. He was still sore from their last session no more than an hour ago.

" No, you whore, it's not."

Jason stiffened at the insult though by now he was immune to them. " Then what, sir?"

" Go give blowjobs in an alley or whatever the hell you want to today. I've got everything covered."

That was unusual, Jason thought.

Sionis normally had the whole day stocked full with things he wanted him to get done. Why was today different? Of course, if he were a normal boss Jason could ask, but on the few times he'd questioned anything he'd been backhanded across the face or thrown to the other side the room.

Roman Sionis was a lot stronger than what he was credited. As strong as Jason, actually, as well as a bit taller.

" Well get out of here, Hood. I don't take particular joy in staring at you when you make my eyes sting."

Jason lowered his gaze, gave a small nod, and turned on his heel to leave. He made sure to close the office door properly to avoid last time's fiasco when he neglected to do so, and made his way down to the lobby.

He didn't really know where to go from there, so he just walked out into the street and didn't care for a destination. Outside, everyone seemed so busily going about their day without cares of drastic proportion, but that may well be because none of them were trying to take down Gotham's crime kingpin, trying and failing that is.

He saw a young man sitting outside a coffee shop, around his age, bragging to his friends about how well his semester at Gotham University had gone. Some part of Jason was jealous. That should be him, or any other normal twenty-year-old should be him right now.

Once he was done with Black Mask, retiring to normalcy seemed inviting.

Jason kept his head down and the hood of his sweater pulled over it, hands thrust deep into his pockets in the hopes that no one paid him any heed, but his pretty face garnered attention from both sexes. Women would give him googly eyes and seductive smiles while Gotham's pig-like breed of men would make lewd remarks in passing. Normally Jason would have broken their appendages for touching him when he didn't want them to, but today he felt numb and uncaring, like everyone had a right to his body.

He wondered if being non-con fucked on a nightly basis had finally broken him or was this just an off day and tomorrow would be better?

Subconsciously, he arrived at a familiar apartment. He stood by the door for several whole minutes, wondering if he should knock or just go back to Mask, he didn't want to bother Roy, after all.

He was about to take his leave when he heard the pounding of running feet down the hall and a shrill little girl voice,

" _JASON!!"_ A red-headed child cannonballed into his legs, effectively throwing off his balance and they both hit the hard ground.

" Ugh, _fuck_." Jason propped himself up on his elbows and winced, the impact did nothing positive for his aching body. The kid, now seated on his chest, pressed her finger against his lips to silence him.

" Bad words are sad words, Jason. That's what daddy says."

" Really?" Jason sat, seriously disbelieving Roy's no swearing policy was actually a thing. It probably only applied to when he was around Lian, anyway.

" Lian, stop knocking people over and - oh my god, Jason." Roy dropped the bags of groceries that had been spilling from his arms and went to help Jason up, apologising the whole time. Roy dusted him off and tucked his little daughter under his arm.

" It's okay, Roy. No harm done." If anything, being toppled by Lian felt relatively pleasant compared to being punched and kicked by Sionis.

" It really isn't. 'M so sorry." Roy struggled to jiggle his keys into the lock with the bags by his feet and Lian dangling from him. Jason decided to give him a hand and took the kid off him, settling her on the curve of his hip.

" Thanks, babe." Roy said gratefully once he got the door open and Jason inclined his head with a little nod.

Between them, the two men managed to get themselves, several bags of groceries, and one six-year-old girl into the house.

It took some time, but they placed everything where it went in the cupboards and Roy switched on the TV so Lian could watch Paw Patrol. Her favourite character was Everest, she kept telling Jason, over... and over... and over again.

Jason sat on the edge of the couch, fumbling with his hands until Roy reappeared from the kitchen, holding two steaming mugs. He gave Jason one and sat next to him, slinging his arm over the backrest.

" Thanks, ginger." Jason half-smiled and gave the brew an experimental sniff. " Tea?"

" Uh-huh," Roy blew on his. " Chamomile."

Jason didn't ask where the odd choice came from, just took a small sip that burned his mouth but he hardly cared, the soft flavour was savoury nonetheless.

With a deep sigh, he leaned into Roy, who put his arm around his shoulders and planted a kiss on the top of his head. Jason's eyes closed and he wanted to stay nuzzled up against the archer forever, breathing in his addictive scent.

" So how's it going with Mask? Any closer to busting the fucke..." his eyes drifted to Lian, who was glaring at him from in front of the TV. " _Jerk_. Any closer to busting the jerk?" Lian gave her nod of approval at him rethinking his word usage and returned to cheering the pups on.

Having to hear that name while he was trying to have a mental health day pricked Jason's skin with goosebumps and he wanted to do nothing less than to tell Roy how drastically everything had gone south. He would just worry and if he found out about Mask hurting him, he'd gear up with his bow and quiver and get himself killed trying to get revenge.

Jason knew because he'd do the same thing if anyone ever did to Roy what was done to him every night.

" It's hit a bit of a standstill right now, but it's not getting worse either. I got his trust and it won't be long until I can turn that on him."

" Perfect. You got this, babe." Roy kissed his temple and Jason wanted to die for lying to him and filling him with false hope.

" When you've busted his... _donkey_ , you, me, and Lian are going to the beach for the day. To celebrate and just kick back."

Although the likeliness of that actually happening was very slim, Jason smiled tiredly.

" That sounds nice. Yeah, we should do that."

" Then it's a promise."

Then Roy shifted and pulled away, looking down at him. He studied Jason's dull eyes encircled with maroon bags and the sizeable bruise on his cheekbone. He set his mug aside and cupped Jason's face with one hand, gently brushing his thumb over the black mark.

" Where'd you get this?"

" My lifestyle is pretty harsh, Harper. I get a few scrapes here and there." He shrugged but Roy stared at him sternly. He hated when Jason made excuses or danced around a topic.

Jason blew his cheeks out and sighed again.

" Fracking heck, fine. I got into a struggle with a drug dealer and got sucker punched."

" You weren't wearing your hood?" Roy arched a brow, immensely sceptical of this story. " That thing absorbs impact by 80%. Were you fighting freaking Superman to still get a bruise this size?"

" Right - I, uh, it got damaged - the hood did, so I wasn't wearing it when I got hit."

" Sure." Nothing in Roy's voice suggested that he believed Jason, but he also knew Jason really didn't want to talk about this and with how exhausted he seemed, the archer didn't wish to pursue it just yet, but definitely later when he'd recharged his batteries.

Roy didn't continue talking to him and Jason kept stealing small hesitant glances of him, wondering if he'd pissed his ginger off. He didn't think he could take Roy being mad at him, too. Not right now when the scratches Sionis left on him were still bloody.

When they'd finished their tea, Roy stood, collected the cups, and went into the kitchen to put them into the sink. He was aware of the fact that Jason rose a second after he had and followed him like a shadow.

" You know I don't mean to piss you off as much as I do." Jason quietly said, his voice so small and tired.

Roy stared. It really hadn't occurred to him that Jason thought he was angry at him. The Jason he knew, the one who a year ago had gone undercover, wouldn't have cared if someone was breathing fire because of him. He had just never cared, so why was he like this now?

" Oh, baby," he pulled Jason into an embrace he accepted in submission, not willingness, just submission. " I'm not angry. I'm worried  
about you. This whole this is going as planned but it's still taking a serious toll on you."

Jason scoffed into his chest but it went unheard. Roy really had no idea and he needed to keep it that way.

" I'm just having an off day."

" This job seems to be giving you a lot of those. I'm serious, Jason, when you're done with Mask, no more undercover gigs or infiltrations. Got it?"

" You don't need to tell me twice, ginger. I got it."

Roy craned his neck and pressed his mouth to Jason's, smiling through the kiss. " Mmh. Good."

Jason had to remind himself to respond to the kiss and not just play dead like he'd become so used to. He pushed a little moan out of his throat and pressed deeper against Roy, almost comfortable with the moment until he felt fingers toy with the hem of his shirt and then slide beneath it to caress his skin, coming dangerously close to discovering the marks.

A thousand memories flashed through his head at once and he took a sharp step backwards, bumping into the counter and knocking a mug off it with a loud shatter of glass.

Roy stared in shock, momentarily at a loss as to what just happened. Jason tried to keep his breathing calm but he was hyperventilating and holding the counter side in a white-knuckled grip. His eyes were as wide as someone who just saw the devil.

" Jason..." Roy put one hand on his shoulder and used the other to tilt his chin upwards so they could meet gazes, but it was obvious that wasn't what Jason wanted to do, but this time, Roy didn't give him the choice not to.

" Jason, what's wrong? What happened?"

" Nothing." He pushed Roy's hands away and put on a difficult to attain 'good face'.

" Nothing, sorry. I'm just being stupid and jumpy. Haven't slept a lot lately."

" Is that really it?" God, Roy hoped it was.

" Yeah."

" Why not take a nap while you're here? It's probably a whole lot more peaceful than camping out at Mask's."

" Yeah, good idea. That'd be.. nice."

 

* * *

 

There wasn't a lot in between Roy's worried and disbelieving eyes in the kitchen to when Jason found himself standing alone in the bedroom he used to find solace in, now it just felt like a prison of better times.

He hated how Sionis had ruined everything.

How everything he'd used to love and now even every inch of his body felt decrepit.

Wounded tears began to form heavily as he thought how every time Roy's gentle hands touched him, he could only see that monster in the leather mask.

He. Had. Taken. _Everything_.

Jason had to take something back.

The noises from Lian's show, muffled by the closed door, made no recollection in his head. The need to leave was overwhelming and he opened the window, desperate to be gone before Roy came to check on him.

He would be back soon, hopefully before anyone noticed he'd left, but there was something he needed to do.

He climbed down the fire escape and jumped the last few meters, breaking into a sprint that turned into full-fledged running the instant his feet were on the ground. He ran and ran, barely feeling the burning in his lungs or the caged burn in his chest that banged against his ribs, trying to escape, all he could think of was Sionis finally getting what was coming to him.

He didn't stop running until he was back at Black Mask's HQ and going through his weapons stash, looking for the perfect one to use. A gun was too obvious, he wouldn't get within a hundred feet of his target with one, but a knife was smaller and inconspicuous, plus, he thought with a smile, it would hurt and he was determined to make it hurt a lot.

Sionis was at a meeting with two partners of his drug ring but when his eyes landed upon Jason, waiting by the door, his jaw visibly set and his face became angered. He told the men to leave in a less polite way and ordered Jason over once they were gone.

" What the fuck are you doing here? I told you to go." He left his desk, practically hissing as he walked up to Jason and stared him down, standing a few inches closer than what was considered a reasonable distance.

" I know, sir, but there's something I forgot to do." He fought not to glare all his hatred out at the man, the knife behind his back trembling in his hand. The wonderful sound of his screams and then a rush of warm blood was less than a minute away and he could barely wait.

He'd wanted to kill the bastard since he was first forced down by those scarred hands. Now he just didn't care if the mission would be jeopardized because with Sionis dead, he was still winning.

" Oh? And what's that, huh? Desperate to perform your little whore duties in my office or were you here for those men who just left?" Mask snatched his face and squeezed hard but Jason didn't pleasure him with wincing or whimpering, he could only grit his teeth as his blood boiled.

He held the dagger tighter for one moment when - _he_ swung out and caught Mask in the middle with a lovely slicing feel and gasp of pain but he lingered too long in the sheer joy of making the man bleed and a solid fist landed itself in his throat. Immediately his world lit up in pain and the stumbled back, however, refusing to relinquish hold of the knife.

" You little slut," Sionis growled after taking a quick examination of the slash across his formerly immaculate white suit and his abdomen.

There was blood, but not enough to be from a fatal wound.

 _Fuck_.

Jason had missed.

How had he missed??

Jason was about to finish the job when a sudden firework went off in his head and radiated pain around his skull. He shrieked and could do nothing to keep from dropping the weapon, clutching his scalp with hooked fingers burrowing into his flesh.

This wasn't right. Wasn't natural. It was as if someone was burning his brain with white fire from a blowtorch.

What the fuck was this?!

Sionis was chuckling as he gathered the fallen knife and then landed a kick in Jason's side, sending his writhing form crashing hard onto the ground.

" Remember that drug last night, baby? That was a neuro-organic virus I decided would be a good failsafe in case you're ever dumb enough to try this. I'd honestly hoped it would never have to be used."

Jason was gasping as blood began to pour from his mouth and nose, god, some was even coming out of his eyes. The pain was unreal and no scream, no matter how tortured, could describe it.

Someway, he knew it wasn't going to stop until his brain was melted into a liquid.

" See, it releases an acid into you through your bloodstream. Your whole body is being liquefied from the inside out, darling, but the pain's worst in your head."

He knelt, knife still in hand, and observed the growing blood stains forming across Jason as the walls of his veins were bursting and unleashing his life fluid.

It was a terrible way to die, Sionis would admit, but this was definitely a deserving candidate.

Even so, he liked to deal with wannabe assassins personally.

He collected Jason's upper body into his arms and propped his head up against his arm, the difficulty of holding the screaming younger man down lessening and lessening as he faded rapidly.

" Shh," Sionis covered his mouth and forced the bloody eyes to meet his.

" Don't scream, baby, don't scream. It'll all be over soon."

Jason wanted to fight to get out of Sionis' lap when his whole world was met with a searing slice of pain and he caught a glimpse of the silvery blade of his knife sailing through his stomach with a spray of blood.

He screamed against Sionis' hand and thrashed but the blade came again and again and continued to do so until everything was sinking into a familiar black haze. He tried to fight it back but he knew there was no winning, not then and not now.

Roy's arm around his waist and Lian's sweet little giggle ran through his fuzzying mind and then the salty smell of the ocean.

Tears pricked his eyes.

He was going to have to make Roy break his promise.

 _'I'm sorry, Roy'_ was the last thing he remembered thinking before the last drop of warmth from his blood drained onto the floor and all that was left was the cruel iron embrace of Black Mask's arms around him.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> This takes place five months after the previous chapter.

Silent as a night under the desert stars, a silhouette belonging to the Dark Knight crept along the halls of Doctor Pyg's latest hideout, a vacated warehouse that used to and still did to a degree, store pharmaceutical equipment. It was the perfect place for the madman to create his dollotrons or even the next breed of monsters his twisted heart desired. 

The sound of mumbling and glass phials clinking together lead Batman to the centre of the building, hidden by the shadows cast upon him as he observed Pyg pouring brightly glowing chemicals into a measurement jug and going over calculations with himself.

" Working late, Pyg?" He stepped into view, his deep glare and the black cowl drawn over his head making for an intimidating sight. The professor gasped and dropped his chemical concoctions, turning on his heel and making a daring attempt at running from the man who was the embodiment of fear among Gotham's criminal underbelly. Batman was no longer surprised when they tried running, just mildly irked. They were wasting his time as much as they were their own.

In just a few long strides he had Pyg trapped against the tabletop with his arm twisted behind his back painfully, the promise of a severe break lingering in the air should he continue to stupidly resist.

" _Black Mask_. Over the past months, you've accepted a three million dollar bribe from him. What was that bribe for?" Batman twisted his limb further and pressed the side of his face into the wood of the table. His voice was gruff and gravelly, usually frightening enough on its own to extract any nugget of information from those he needed it from.

" He'll kill me if I tell!" Pyg squealed, ironically for his namesake.

" Do you think the alternative is any better?" Again, he added force to the chubby little man, who had wisely feared him enough in the past to always be forthcoming.

" God. Oh god. I'm dead. I'm so goddamn dead." Pyg stammered to himself, fear he well deserved alive in his eyes. Unfortunately for him, the Caped Crusader wasn't in a patient mood tonight; he thrust Pyg's arm upward with a sickening break he was used to and a ragged scream that was even more familiar.

" Okay! Fucking hell! He needed me to make someone susceptible!"

Batman stiffened. He knew what the professor meant by susceptible. Pyg specialized in psychological torture and brainwashing, and it seemed like Sionis had needed his expertise, but who was he willing to pay three mil for? No one mattered that much to him, so it must mean he had one hell of an asset in his hands right now. Red Hood had sent him regular updates on his mission infiltrating Mask via voicemails and burner phone text messages and he'd mentioned nothing of this. If Jason knew so would his surrogate father. Whatever Sionis was up to it was extremely well kept from even his inner circle.

" Who was the subject?" Batman demanded gruffly.

" Didn't get his name, some doll-faced kid - doll.... God, he was so pretty. So... Unique... Too many distinguishing features, though." Pyg was rambling again, busily dreaming of turning the person in question into a lovely dollotron with no god-awful differentiation, just a beautiful drone identical to hundreds just like him. His idea of perfection.

Disgusted by the madman, Batman yanked him to his feet and slapped a pair of zip ties around his wrists without a care if he jarred the arm he just broke. There was no pain or tragedy that no matter how menial, Pyg didn't deserve.

The Dark Knight dragged the still rambling professor outside the warehouse, about to alert Gordon and have Pyg sent back to Arkham when something small zipped past him, too fast to be seen, and slammed into Pyg's chest with a puff of fine red mist. There was no time for a scream, no time for anything, before he collapsed at Batman's feet, dead as a rock.

It had long since become instinct for Batman to react with split-second calculation, the sniper was on the roof of the building on the opposite side of the road, and he was out in the open.

A second bullet clipped the ear of his cowl, destined for a place between his eyes it would have certainly hit if he had not leapt behind the cover of a burned out car. The shooter wasn't dumb enough to attempt another hit and he was really smart, he was running by now because the Dark Knight had his scent. 

Batman waited for the bare minimum of time that assured the coast was clear before going in pursuit of who could only Black Mask's hitman, sent to silence the professor.

It pressed on Batman's mind that Mask even knew where to send his sniper, but that was a concern for a later date.

He broke into a run and flew up the fire escape ladder onto the roof, catching a fleeting glimpse of a man leap off the ledge and land on a building slight below it, a rifle on his shoulder.

Like a predatory animal on the heels of its prey, he raced across the space between them but kudos to this guy, he was fast, faster than Batman, whose strong suit wasn't parkour. 

The sniper sprinted across the rooftop and leapt over the 10-foot gap, swinging his arms back and landing precisely. He rolled from his shoulder to his feet in less than a second and used the momentum from the roll to keep on running. He jumped again, deftly catching the edge of the next roof with both hands and bringing his knees to his chest to kick out with enough force to propel himself upward.

Once again he broke into a brisk run, throwing a glance over his shoulder to see that Batman hot on his heels. Tucking his knees into his chest, the sniper cannonballed through the skylight of an abandoned apartment block, plummeting down the stairwell like a rock. He waited for five or six storeys before he caught the stair railing to end his rapid descent, easily twisting his body onto solid ground. From there the chase continued, he was off like a bullet, taking bounds rather than steps. Batman's pounding footfalls were right behind him but not closing in, more like barely keeping up.

Angling his shoulder to take most of the blow, he jumped headlong out of the nearest window, shattering glass that sprayed across the floor. His frenzied momentum translated into a vertical jump. He reached towards the top of the opposing wall with his left hand and soon was pulling himself up it.

He was almost in the clear when Batman leapt at him, catching his ankle and dragging him downward. Batman had the upper hand, he twisted the man beneath him during the fall, their combined bodyweight as well as the impact crushing him when they met ground.

Landing on his feet as always, the Dark Knight approached the fallen figure who was just barely picking himself off the ground. The situation seemed very deja vu and he would have been forgiven for thinking at first that the sniper was Red Hood, for they had a very similar outfit.

But this hitman wore a black hood instead of a red one, complete with scuffed whitish paint that made his face resemble a skull. His suit looked remarkably much like something Batman had seen before, dark jeans, holsters and belts zig-zagging his body, and a plain grey bodysuit where he almost expected to see a red bat plastered across the crest. 

Batman roughly grabbed his shoulder, about to fling him around and drag him off the ground when an elbow ploughed into his face in an explosion of pain. He lost sight of the man for less than a second but in that time, he had somehow vanished.

Wiping blood from his lip with the back of his gloved hand, Batman cursed himself while he summoned the batmobile and scoured every inch of the city for a five-mile radius.

 _I had him,_ he kept thinking, _right in my hands. I had him._

 

* * *

 

The search brought up nothing and he returned to the cave, his efforts fruitless. The night was growing ancient with only an hour before dawn. His options consisted of getting a measly bit of shuteye or looking further into Sionis's new player, and you didn't need to be Einstein to guess which one he did. 

He peeled his cowl off, transforming back into Bruce Wayne, and sat heavily in the chair before numerous computer monitors, each one processing different data.

He ran several searches into the man he'd chased but his carbon print was non-existent, that however, was not the biggest concern on Bruce's mind.

 _Jason_.

Jason hadn't mentioned anything about Mask's project with Pyg, whatever that may be. He was Sionis's second, how was it that he didn't know?

Bruce went around reaching out to him, waiting by the monitor as it connected the call. Like Jason had started doing a while ago, he kept the camera off when he picked up.

 _" What?"_ His tone was curt and readied, also something he now did, but the rehearsal of his speech wasn't anything Bruce dwelled on. But he did notice how Jason sounded winded, like he'd been running.

 _Curious_ , he thought.

" I ran into a sniper today, black helmet with a white skull painted over it. Works for Mask. Sound familiar?" 

There was a moment of silence.

_" No, sorry. Doesn't ring a bell."_

" What about Pyg? He said he and Sionis are in bed together, shortly before the sniper got him."

Another pause.

_" Pyg and Sionis aren't working together. I'd know if they were. He was probably just looking for a way to cover his own ass."_

" Alright. Stay safe." With those final words, Bruce hung up with the press of a button, and rested his chin on his intertwined fingers, a deep frown causing ripples across his forehead.

Jason's information had always been reliable, except that last part. Mask would not have sent the sniper to kill Pyg if he truly knew nothing and was just lying.

No.

Pyg was dead to stop him talking about the new asset. 

What was such a secret that Sionis wouldn't even tell his second? Or did Jason know.... and was lying?

There was no version of this hypothesis that Bruce liked.

* * *

_Sionis stared at the deathly limp body floating in the tank before him, cables and tubes connecting to it from various machines that's uses he didn't know the half of._

_Were it up to the ragged rips the knife had caused or the neuro toxin, Jason would be cold and dead by now, but Sionis had decided the little turncoat didn't deserve such a mercy as death and he may have uses for the Red Hood yet._

_" The damage is quite substantial, sir." Doctor Hughes explained, eyeing charts and scans of Jason's body held on a clipboard._

_" Severe internal bleeding as well as second-degree burns on his veins inner linings, organ damage, internal ruptures, a degree of possible paralysis, brain damage-"_

_" I don't care about all that crap." Sionis snapped, tearing his gaze from Jason to glare hideously at the man, who couldn't hold his eyes. " Can you fix him or not?"_

_" Well, no, not like this. The second we unplug one of those machines, he's dead. His body can't sustain itself. However..." He left a deliberate pause that made Sionis feel tempted to bury his fist in his face, but he held back with some serious strain._

_" We have an experimental techno-organic substance designed to regrow limbs and organs - synthetically, of course. Sir, we could make him a better soldier, a more complying one. But.." The hype in the techie's voice died down and Sionis narrowed his eyes in his direction._

_" But what?"_

_" But, if this goes wrong, sir, it will go really wrong. This is a non-tested treatment."_

_Sionis nodded, turning his attention back to Jason. His eyes were shut lightly, highlighting his strangely dark lashes. Stitches held his skin together and the bruises on him were bountiful, but still, he looked damn pretty to Sionis._

_It had recently come to light that Jason was working for Batman, leaking intel left and right, so restoring him would certainly have some serious perks if they also possessed the reigns to his mind. They could have all the Bat's secrets as well as feed him bogus information._

_" Well, since I don't fancy being a necrophile with a sex doll, I suggest we try your experimental method."_

* * *

 

" Nicely done, son." Sionis grinned behind his mask, placing his hand on Jason's shoulder after the call ended and Jason remained staring with vacant eyes at the burner phone in his fist. It trembled slightly. 

" That fool believes every word." He removed the phone from Jason and set it aside on a table, right next to the black helmet with a painted on skull.

" Just like I said." He finished with a sinister little chuckle that Jason didn't respond to, only stared at the ground.

It was the most satisfying thing in the world to send Batman on a wild goose chase.

Sionis no longer  cared for the distance between them and made quick work of closing it. He took Jason by his hair, getting only a small grunt, and pulled him to his chest, lacing his arms around his waist in such a way that would have stopped him escaping the embrace in the past, but now it was pointless say for force of habit.

Sionis had to admit, he really liked the version of Jason whose free will had been destroyed by the ingenious of Professor Pyg.

It was a shame the man had to be terminated, he had truly been a worthy partner to have, but as the saying goes, loose lips get a hollow point. 

The success made Sionis crave a victory bang. Add insult to injury concerning the Bat and the way he thought everything was going well for Jason.

And it just so happened that he had his favourite mindless sex doll in his arms.

He shoved Jason into the wall and pressed up against him hard, wrapping his fist tighter around the handful of ebony hair. Jason whimpered even though the pain didn't fully register in his mind, it just seemed like the natural reaction to what was one of Sionis favourite activities. Yanking his hair out. 

Sionis was aware how Jason hardly felt anything he did, or then had just become so dissociated that it made no mental mark.

And that was what he missed about the fiery Red Hood; the satisfaction of making him scream.

But, fucking him bloody up against a wall did help numb the sense of longing to a degree.

Sionis grinned to himself, dragging Jason's head back by his hair while he thought how he sure was glad he'd decided to keep him.   
  
His body was torn at and in a state of constant jolting with Roman Sionis breathing heavily in his ear, but all Jason did was stare at the black skull hood on the table.

He knew it wasn't his.

It wasn't _him_.

And he knew if he were looking in the mirror, the person he would see would be none the more familiar.   
  


**Notes for the Chapter:**

> A special thanks goes to the lovely Nance who encouraged (more like demanded) me to make this more than the oneshot I originally intended, they also gave me some great ideas so credit goes to them, too. Also, thanks for taking such an interest in this, mate. I seriously appreciate it.


	3. Chapter 3

The next time Batman laid eyes upon the skull masked assassin was a whole four weeks later.

He was seconds away from interrupting a weapons sale on the docks and putting a serious dent into Black Mask's drug empire when a hard kick caught him off guard, blowing his cover and lo and behold, above him loomed an adversary who though a stranger, felt familiar.

Immediately Batman threw himself into action, charging the slightly smaller man who kept dodging attacks instead of landing blows of his own.

He was trying to tire the Dark Knight out and reserve his own strength for a strong counter, a decent tactic if his opponent hadn't already seen it all.

Batman threw his weight behind a punch that caught him in the jaw with a solid smack. The sniper's head snapped back and he fell clear off the shipping container their fight had taken them to.

The bastard wasn't getting away this time, Batman swore as he dove after and they continued to trade blows, connecting hit after hit as if this foe was acquainted with the Caped Crusader's fighting technique, the one he himself had customized from tens of martial arts from around the world. It was impossible for anyone to know it yet here was the contradiction to his belief, right before him.

Then Batman aimed one hard hit that crashed straight into the metal faceplate of the hood, leaving a fist-shaped indentation.

He grabbed the man's arm as he flailed them back to keep his balance and continued to hit him until blood spurted from beneath the mask. This man needed to be subdued but unlike every other person on the receiving end of the Bat's fists, he wouldn't back down. His heart and soul were fused with the need to succeed in his mission. 

The sniper knew he was fighting Batman, and no one else.

Just Batman.

So why was the fragrance that radiated off him so familiar and why did he ache every time he drew blood or caused a bruise? 

Sir going to be angry and hurt him if he didn't defeat Batman, but he couldn't. It wasn't a question of skill or lack of it, if he kept going he might win, but he just _couldn't_. It felt wrong. 

From the corner of his peripheral vision, he saw that the men he was sent to protect were escaping with the cargo, which meant he could go too and not a second too soon. He turned on his heel and ran, the wind howling in his ears despite the mask that was now damaged and the night vision glitching, making it difficult to see.

He could turn it back to normal visibility and thus lose half his sight to the dark of Gotham's night, or take the hood off - but Black Ma - _Sir,_ had warned him to never be seen outside without it, especially by the enemy. 

Batman leapt into pursuit of him and hurled a grappling hook at his legs, halting and yanking back the rope in his hands the second it became tangled but before it could grow taut the sniper - whose skills he'd previously underestimated - grabbed a knife from his holster and sliced through the rope the in one fluid  movement.

One fluid, _extremely_ familiar, movement.

Batman paused, stalling and therefore unable to predict or block the roundhouse kick that sent him spiralling to the ground, yet somehow, that was not the worst blow of the night. 

A truck carrying their precious cargo whizzed past the skull masked man and he didn't think twice before throwing himself at it, snatching the back door in his hand, and catching a ride as they zoomed away from the baffled Dark Knight faster and faster. 

 _He didn't follow,_ the sniper asked himself, _why didn't he follow?_

The truck sped away and didn't remain within view for long, but even as it was gone Batman remained to stare after it.

_Who. Was. That man?_

He knew his fighting style as well as Jason's, it seemed.

That was impossible.

The immediate moment his brain kicked back into working mode he dragged the communicator from a compartment in his belt and connected a call to Jason.

He needed to see if Jason still knew nought but more importantly, if he was alright.

To know those moves the sniper must have fought Red Hood continuously and studied him, maybe even… won.

It had been well over seven months since they last met face to face and Batman had been at a deep unrest for more than half that time, but as the city that was hellbent on breaking the law, Gotham hadn't given him the time to properly check up on him.

Jason was childish enough to withhold information if he was pissed. 

It rang and rang but wasn't picked up and Batman grew more unsettled as well as vexed, part of him hoping Jason was simply ignoring him instead of engaged in something dangerous right now, but experience said it was the latter. 

That man, he was fast, strong, durable to an almost inhumane extent, but also involved with Black Mask and therefore technically meant he was part of Jason's investigation and that any interference from the Bat could jeopardize everything his son had worked for, for over a year and a half now.

But Batman also knew that it had been stupid of him to leave all that responsibility to Jason, especially now that he was more well-read on the skull masked man's skills and efficiency.

He was a danger he was not about to leave the Red Hood to deal with when he already had Black Mask. The last message had suggested Jason was close to meeting the goal he had set out for, and now if ever, he didn't need any excess threats.

In his mind's eye, he could already see Jason's throwing a hissy-fit at him for getting involved and accusing Batman of treating him as he would a child.

The migraine of that was already setting in.

The Dark Knight summoned the batplane and headed back to the cave when it arrived.

He needed to run some searches but after that, finding Jason was the top priority, and only one person would know where he was right now.

Or at least, he hoped.

* * *

 

" I'm coming, I'm _coming_." Roy yawned loudly, covering his mouth with his hand and rubbing the sleep from his eyes with the other.

He glanced at the clock ticking quietly on the wall as he crossed the living room on his way to the door someone seemed to be breaking down with a flurry of knocks. Seven am on the dot. Who the hell - other than Lian - dared interrupt his beauty sleep?

Roy clicked the lock open and pulled the door back, not caring how disgruntled or lethargy he looked at this hour until he saw who was there to see him and his posture immediately bettered. 

 _Bruce frigging Wayne._         

" Good morning, Roy," he smiled his rehearsed smile, usually reserved for business meetings or charity events. His eyes, as black as his smartly tailored suit, glittered with something Roy could not quite name but even as the man smiled he looked intimidating as hell.

No wonder Jason intimidated by his dad.

" I hope I didn't wake you." He went onto say, his voice reserved and put together, another trick of his trade.

" Uh, no, you didn't - I mean, you did, but it's alright. I needed to get up anyway and - fuck, sorry. I'm rambling. Would you like to come in?"

" If it's not a bother, I would dearly like to discuss something with you. It's to do with Jason."

Immediately Roy stepped aside to allow him in, eager for any news regarding his absent of late swain. His behaviour was an instant indicator to Bruce, who read people with more ease than he did books, that he didn't know where his son was.

And so the weight on his chest grew heavier.

He'd known something was wrong for a long time now, but he just _had_ to respect Jason's wishes and not get involved.

He should have known Jason was in over his head.

* * *

 

" Yeah, sorry, Mr Wayne," Roy said, returning from his bedroom with a scrap of paper.

Bruce sat waiting at the kitchen table with a mug of coffee in his hands, unbeknownst to Roy, it was his eight one in these past few hours.

At this point, caffeine flowed through his veins more abundantly than blood or even life.

" I haven't seen him in over half a year. Figured he was in a place he couldn't talk or reach out." Roy explaining with notable concern. He sat in the chair opposite his guest and pushed the paper forth.

" He did leave this though, but I don't think it'll be a lot of help."

Bruce thanked him as he took note in his hand and scanned over the hastily written text. He noticed now dried teardrops had mingled with the smudged ink, perhaps reminiscent of Roy's grief all those nights Jason didn't come home.

_Sorry to leave without saying goodbye, ginger. Have something important to do but I'll be back soon and we'll go beaching like you wanted. Tell Lian that Jay loves her._

_X Jason_

" Looks like he wasn't planning on staying away long." Bruce observed when he finally tore his eyes away and handed it back to the retired archer. Roy took it with the same level of caress he would treat a holy relic and gently folded it into his pocket.

" Do you have any idea where he went, Roy?" Bruce asked despite being fairly certain he knew. Somehow the skull masked man tied into Jason's absence, he just wasn't sure how yet. Perhaps with the new player, it had gotten too dangerous for Jason to be in contact with the Harpers.

" No, not really. I woulda gone to find him ages ago but with Lian...." His gaze drifted to the little girl watching her favourite show in her pyjamas. She was hugging the Everest-doll Jason had gotten her when she turned six and staring eyes wide at the TV screen as the pups leapt into another adventure. Her bowl of cornflakes sat forgotten next to her, long since turned to mush.

" Jason wouldn't want you to endanger her for his sake, Roy."

" I know." With a heavy hand, he roughly wiped something from the corner of his eye although it wasn't much good when the sadness wouldn't stop welling.

" You know, she asks about him. Almost every day, 'Daddy, where's Jason? When is he coming come?' And every time I have to lie to her. I hate lying to Lian, but how am I supposed to tell her that he might be dead or worse? That he might never come home?"

Bruce observed him with understanding rarely associated with him in his gaze. He reached across the table and placed his hand on Roy's shoulder, giving it a firm yet solacing squeeze.

" We do the best we can for our children with the lifestyle we lead, and sometimes that means lying to them to protect them. You're doing the right thing, Roy, if I had kept my boys from following in my footsteps, who knows? Maybe we wouldn't be here now."

Roy sniffed and nodded, rubbing his palms against his emerald hues so hard Bruce feared he would grind away the bone of his sockets.

" He's not dead, Roy."

" Of course he's not." The ginger smiled sadly, the whites of his eyes turned red and bloodshot.

" He's Jason. Death can't hold him."

Bruce inclined his head, fingers drumming a gentle inaudible pattern against the porcelain side of the mug.

" No. I'll find him, don't worry, but you and Lian should leave Gotham for a while. Things could escalate once Batman butts heads with Roman Sionis. Jason wouldn't want you or your daughter anywhere near the blast radius, not to mention any one of many leads could connect you to Jason. We don't need Mask to have anything to hold over him and we don't want Lian to be a target."

" I've been thinking about taking a road trip to see Ollie in Star City anyway, this is the perfect excuse to do that."

" Good. Stay there for a while."

Small footsteps tapered across the cool stone flooring of the kitchen and both men looked to see Lian standing by the table with her stuffed dog dangling from her hand by its tail.

" We're going to go see Uncle Oliver?" She asked in her high pitched little girl voice. The excitement was alight on her small round face, the corners of her lips still bearing a mark of the milk she'd drank from her cereal. From the corner of his gaze, Bruce noticed the bowl of cornflake mush was laying on its face on the living room rug.

" Yes, baby. He says he misses us." Roy explained as he reached out his arms to her.

" Oh, goodie." Lian smiled sweetly as she climbed into her father's lap and settled there with a content expression. 

" Is Jason going to come, Daddy? Oh, please say he's coming! Daddy please!"

Bruce sat by, unable to do anything but watch the pain in Roy stir behind the fake the smile he wore as he lied to his daughter why Jason wasn't coming with this time.

 

* * *

 

Jason stared down at the broken black helmet in his hands, unable to meet the angry red glare of Roman Sionis.

He'd failed to kill the Bat, he failed his mission and his master.

Any beating he got was well deserved some small voice in his head said, forcing him to believe it without the input of his own choices.

" I don't know if you realise how much money I spent — and apparently _wasted_ — on you, boy, and you just fail a simple mission?"

Jason flinched at the hostility in his voice and he wanted to close his eyes or cover his ears or just do something to block it out, but he remembered by heart which punishment different acts of disobedience were repaid with.

Not paying attention to a superior would get him three hours of waterboarding and the skin whipped off his back.

Sionis took his face in his hand and forced Jason to look at him. He relished inwardly in the glimmer of panic he saw.

" So tell me, boy, are you going fail in killing the Bat again?" He left no room for an answer he didn't want to hear, but Jason swallowed heavily with fear shuddering his breath.

" Who is he?"

_Smack!_

Sionis's ringed hand caught him across the face, leaving a long searing cut in its wake. Jason had grown too ready for these strikes to lose his balance to them anymore, he merely remained standing firmly in his place.

" Did Pyg liquefy your brain so much that you're now completely retarded? He's the goddamn Batman!"

" But... I _remembered_ him. He was familiar."

Jason brow furrowed as he tried to connect the ghost behind to cowl to the scraps of memories he had from his past, but every time he thought he came close to remembering him the hum of electricity began to swirl around in the back of his head, warning him of the high voltage that would course through his skull if he answered wrong.

If he knew.

Sionis was about to hit him again when he saw the sudden flash of opportunity before him.

He lowered his raised fist and placed both his hands on Jason's shoulders, much like a loving father could be imagined doing.

" I wanted to protect you from this, son, but that man, Batman, he's the one who hurt you and the one who put you in that room with Pyg. I saved you from there, remember? Then I sent you to kill Pyg for what he did to you, but Batman tried to stop you. He's the enemy, Jason, and we need to make him pay." 

" _Yes_ ," Jason muttered darkly, recalling the tall figure that loomed over him when he lay bleeding out on the floor, gasping and pleading. That same figure — _Batman_ — had also been present every time Pyg spent hours breaking him. He shivered with rage, desperate to spill the blood of the man who had shattered him.

" So what do you say, son?" Sionis asked, tracing Jason's jawline with his finger. The darkness he saw in those teal eyes told him everything before the boy even had to.

" We need to _kill_ Batman."

" Good lad. Just like papa taught you." Sionis leaned in and kissed him sweetly on the mouth, and this time Jason accepted it as a welcome gesture. After all, he owed it to the man who saved him from the monster behind the cowl.

And no one - _no one,_ could save Batman from him.

* * *

 

_Jason screamed as the lightning threatened to rip his head apart. He bit down hard on the rubber stick between his teeth with tears in his eyes and thrashed against the iron restraints that kept him captive to the chair in the white room._

_When the volts ceased his body collapsed in on itself and his chest heaved. Whatever that scum Black Mask had infused with him to save his life stirred around restlessly and Jason wanted the shocks back just to end the horrible alien sensation of something crawling beneath his skin._

_The rubber was yanked from betwixt his jaws and a chubby man wearing a bloodstained apron and cheap plastic pig mask popped up inches from his face, thrusting a picture of Batman cut from a newspaper at him._

_" Who's this, kid? Now answer smartly." He chuckled behind the mask and his hand trembled eagerly on the lever that would light Jason's head up with the first wrong word._

_" B — Batman." He stammered out, struggling for breath and every sensor in his body was screaming and pleading with him to just submit, but refused. He refused to let them break him._

_" Tsk, tsk, that was not wise, kiddo."_

_The plastic invaded his mouth again and the cruel claws of white-hot fire sunk into his brain, ripping apart his sanity but he had to hold onto it and just keep reminding himself that Bruce was coming, or that Roy would find him, or that he was just fucking having a nightmare._

_But the nightmare wouldn't end._

_In fact, it went on for hours and hours, each time stopping only for the same question;_

_" Who is this?"_

_Jason couldn't let them win no matter how much he wanted for the pain to end._

_" Batman" he would say, or " my mentor", " the guy who's gonna burst in here any minute."_

_But what was taking him?_

_The blurry figure of Roman Sionis was ever present for these sessions, watching without word or emotion as Pyg reaped every bit of pleasure he could from destroying and remoulding Jason on a continuous hell-loop._

* * *

_Three months._

_That's how long it took._

_Three months of being electrocuted, beaten, burned, whipped, waterlogged, brainwashed and Jason finally had to admit to himself that the man he'd been praying for wasn't coming._

_No one was ever coming._

_" Who is this?" Pyg demanded with a fraction of the patience he'd had when this all started._

_He thrust the same old picture of a large man in a bat suit at him as Jason coughed out fluid from his lungs. The tub he'd only just been pulled out of sat forebodingly behind him, the still black water's surface warning him that it would welcome him in its embrace if he answered wrong._

_Jason blinked, once, twice, staring past the photo even when he tried to focus on it. It was blurred, both in his mind and in Pyg's hand._

_He tried to fight the urge, he tried to remind himself that someone was going to find him, but he no longer knew who or why. When wasn't even a question because he knew it was never._

_And then he finally answered,_

_" I don't know."_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> We finally begin to see what broke the Hood. Roman, you bastard. How fucking dare you?
> 
> Btw, Roy knows who Bats is.


	4. Chapter 4

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Warning, this gets epically dark.

  _Jason couldn't believe a merciful God had finally remembered he existed - that Pyg had forgotten to lock his cell for the night and that he'd been able to get away from the colossal building that cast a shadow over all of Gotham._

_Every fibre of his being ached as he ran, feet pounding hard against the asphalt,  but the rush of the wind through his hair and the coolness of fresh air filling his lungs was enough to make him forget the pain but more than that, seeing the two people he loved most in the world had him pumped._

_He was excited, desperate, and terrified, what if Roy couldn't see past the scars and terrible things that had happened to him? What if... what if Roy was mad that Jason hadn't been home in so long?_

_The idea was almost what it took to stall him in his steps, but he had to keep telling himself that Roy loved him, despite everything and above all._

_And so he kept running, running until empty streets became familiar ones, running until his chest constricted and didn't allow him to breathe painlessly, running until he was at the door he wanted to break down at and cry from all manner of reasons._

_He was home, he was free, except, he realised with sickening intensity, that something terrible had happened here when he had been gone. The door was kicked in and the apartment was dark, the strong reek of decaying blood heavy in the air._

_" Oh, no, no god, please no."_

_The words came out of his mouth as no more than a whisper as he rushed into a scene that made him give a tortured scream that turned into a broken whimper._

_Lian, Roy, both dead._

_Their limbs and organs were strewn across the crimson-covered floor as no more than dirty laundry. It looked like they had been dismembered and gutted while they had been alive, their mouths agape as if they were still crying out._

_Roy was hugging his daughter to his chest with his one arm that remained attached to his body and Lian's face, eyelids shut and purple, was badly bruised, like someone had punched her repeatedly. Her fingernails had been torn out and she was missing both her legs._

_The stuffed dog Jason had gifted her with lay on its side in a puddle of blood. It too seemed to stare at him._

_Gasping like he'd been hit, Jason covered his face with his shaking hands and collapsed to his knees._

_His nails dug into his cheeks and eyes and he wanted to tear the damned things out just to end the horror movie livestream, but it was already branded into his brain. He screamed and cried and scratched his face bloody. There was no part of him that didn't want to crawl next to them and die._

_" Daddy stopped waking up." And eerie little voice said. Jason's head snapped up from his hands and he stared at Lian, now sitting with her back to him and both hands placed on Roy's still chest. His breath caught in his throat and trembled._

_" L - Lian?"_

_" When they stopped making Daddy scream, they started hurting me, and then..." She trailed off, running a crooked finger jaggedly across her throat with a guttural sound effect from somewhere deep within her crest. Jason stumbled to his feet and began to approach her where she sat slumped._

_It shouldn't have been possible but he so wanted it to be._

_" Lian, baby, it's okay. Jay's here." He reached out to her but stopped when she turned to face him. One eye was gone and her pouty lips were trembling. Jason wanted to hold her and tell her everything was alright, but he couldn't move. He was frozen where he stood._

_" You were here before, and look what you did. Look what you did!" Lian reached into the rip that covered her stomach and started tearing out handfuls of intestines before Jason could stop her, all the while screeching,_

_" Look what you did!"_

_A sudden burst of sounds and screams erupted from all around him and he was surrounded by thousands of tortured wails, each one crying out to him. He twisted around to see where they were coming from but every direction he faced, Lian was there, glaring at him while she tore her own organs out._

_" Look what you did, Jason!" A hand latched around his ankle and Jason glanced down in terror to see Roy pulling himself onto his broken legs with hands that grasped him mercilessly. Jason kicked him away before he could stop himself and stumbled back into the furthest corner._

_" Look what you did! Look what you did! Look what you did! Look what you did!"_

_The chant grew louder and distorted until it went through his head like a freight train that obliterated everything in its path. He caved in on the ground, crying so hard that it wracked his entire being. Roy and Lian kicked and scratched at him, shrieking the same thing over and over even after their voices went hoarse._

_Jason was scared._

_Terrified. His heart beat rapidly against his ribcage as hard as the blows kept coming._

_" I'm sorry!" He cried and curled around his knees. " I'm sorry!"_

_**" LOOK WHAT YOU DID!!"** _

* * *

 

_Sionis watched Jason scream and tear at himself in his cell until he fell onto his side and cried into his knees weakly. He had never seen anyone curl up so defensively or look so broken. In this situation, he imagined a normal person would feel pity or even guilt, but he was just mildly intrigued._

_" I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I'm sorry." Jason kept on repeating to himself, eyes shut tight and tears brimming from between his heavy lashline.  Intermittently, he called out two names again and again, "Roy" and "Lian"._

_Who were they? Sionis absently  wondered._

_He turned to Professor Pyg, who stood by with a great big smile behind his mask. He was rubbing his palms together and trembling with giggles as he watched the young man behind the bars struggling against himself._

_" What the hell did you give him?"_

_" Just some amped up phencyclidine." He replied proudly, like a kid presenting his parents with a picture he'd drawn._

_" On its own, PCP causes dizziness, mental confusion, hallucinations, violent behaviour, a distorted perception, but mixed cocaine and my own little chemical concoction? Oh-hoh-ho! That makes for some pretty wild visions."_

_He gave a low chuckled to himself, staring almost hungrily at Jason as his eyes glistened insanity. Sionis stepped away from him with his brow furrowed in disturbance and upper lip pulled up at one corner._

_" I find to destroy a man," the nutty professor went on, " you must first destroy everything he cherishes, over and over again while all he can do is watch, a prisoner of his own mind."_

_" You really are a sick fuck, Pyg." Sionis commented dryly, for once truly troubled by another person's mind._

_" Oh, you can't really say that, Roman." Pyg grinned behind the cheap mask he'd procured from a party store._

_" Don't tell me you weren't thinking about screwing the boy just now."_

_Sionis turned back to Jason, who'd fallen into some restless fragmented drug-induced state of oblivion._

_Sleep wasn't quite the word to describe it. Even so, he was still crying softly and pitiful whimpers escaped his lips._

_" No. Let him catch breath first."_

* * *

 

Batman stared in horror through the night vision setting of his binoculars as Black Mask first slapped his son across the face then leaned in to kiss him and Jason... Jason seemed to like it, or at least accept it. It wasn't horror that he felt because it was a man, it was because it was _that_ man.

Roman Sionis. 

He wanted to leap off the building that was his perch and glide through the window to punch Sionis back to hell, but he didn't want to interfere with whatever Jason was doing because of course, this had to be part of a master plan he had.

Even if it was, Batman hadn't ever thought Jason would be using _these_ kinds of tactics. To seduce a criminal kingpin to infiltrate his gang?

Well, that was risky and exactly the sort of stupid thing Batman's son was known to do. 

He continued to watch Sionis mining Jason's throat with his tongue at an unease and looked away as often as it allowed, but within minutes it was clear sitting by wasn't an option; Sionis was getting really rough.

He slammed Jason into his desk with enough force to make him wince and held him down on top of it as he began to remove his shirt. And Jason wasn't resisting or fighting him off like the Dark Knight knew he could, he was just being... submissive, like he was a broken toy.

He knew Jason wouldn't be allowing this at all if something wasn't wrong and didn't he needed help.

And is sure as hell looked like he needed help.

Batman surged off the ledge and spread his cape like the wings of his namesake, suspended only seconds before he came crashing through the window with an ear-splitting shattering of glass.

The sharp see-through fragments sprayed across the stone tiled floor but Batman didn't hear it land before his fist was buried in Mask's face and the man was hurtled across the room.  The blow was hard enough to streak the Bat's knuckles with crimson.

" Hood," he grunted out the side of his mouth, poised for a fight with his fists raised.

" Get up, we're going."

He didn't mean to come off as a shotgun-wielding dad collecting his daughter from her boyfriend's house when his parents were out of town.

Jason's head snapped to the fallen Sionis and he rushed to help him back to his feet. Sionis wiped away a dribble of blood from his lip with the back of his hand and glared hell daggers at the intruder in the cowl.

" Are you alright, Sir?" Jason asked, concerned. He fussed around Sionis with his arms like a man deprived of life support.

The Caped Crusader stared, dumbfounded.

What sort of sickness had he allowed to fester within his son?

Sionis slapped away Jason's hands and straightened his blindingly white suit. His leathery black face contorted into a belligerent scowl.

This was taking insult to injury.

" Jason, _kill Batman_." 

Jason launched himself at the man he'd once considered a father with a scream of anger and caught the surprised man in the jaw with a sharp right hook. He came again, striking hard and fast until his fists became a blur mixed with the rapid _thud, thud, thuds_ of flesh hitting flesh.

Batman was never caught off guard for more than a second. Even when it was his son attacking his brain was wired into the response setting, he grabbed Jason's extended arm when he tried to sink it into his face and used his momentum to swing his own much larger body around him.

He hooked his arm and threw it around his son's neck, pulling up on his throat. A strangled cry tore lose from Jason's lungs as he kicked and thrashed madly against his father, who held him firm despite it. 

From the corner of his sight, the Dark Knight saw Sionis approach his desk and attempt to hit the office destruct button hidden beneath it, but a batarang from the Crusader's utility belt zoomed through the air and sank into his shoulder with a splatter of redness before he had the chance to blow them to hell.

The moment Sionis' blood as spilt Jason's mood shifted like flicking off a light switch. He took a fast step back, locked his leg behind Batman's and yanked.

They both fell backwards and Jason twisted, struggled, did whatever it took to escape his prison and started pounding the older man with both his fists. There was nothing coordinated about his methods, he was hitting out of sheer anger.

" Hood!" Batman exclaimed, catching the boy's balled up hand and enveloping it with his own. He couldn't tell what was wrong with his son, only that this was no tactic to further win Sionis' favour.

This was cold hard reality, no deception. 

" That's it, boy! Kill the bastard!" Sionis laughed despite the blood oozing from betwixt the fingers clamped over his shoulder. His eyes glittered with the undiluted thrill of seeing three million dollars and months worth of work finally paying off.

Jason fought his former mentor like a rabid animal and Batman for all his mighty legend, couldn't bear to hurt him and simply dodged everything thrown at him. 

Jason obeyed every word from Sionis' gnarled gob like it was God's law, Batman quickly realised. There was some kind of twisted game of puppets going on here, which meant the puppeteer was the means to an end.

He grabbed Jason by the collar of his shirt and threw into the wall with the hopes it would keep him down at least for a little while. A solid smack erupted in the wake of his son's body colliding with the stone masonry but he needed to look past it for a little while as he propelled himself towards Sionis, spectating by his desk.

The taser in his belt was already out and ready to subdue the man, cables alive with electrical currents tearing through the air at him when in a grey-black blur, Jason threw himself in front of Sionis to protect him.

Immediate contact with the receiving end of the weapon had Jason on the ground, spluttering and convulsing as torrents coursed through him.

Within seconds Batman had the charge off but by then the damage was already done, Jason was down for the count and Mask had pushed the destruct button.

" You can either save the boy, Bats—" Sionis yelled over his shoulder, already fleeing the room. " — or you can come after me!"

Though it happened at dizzying speed, there was never any debate for Gotham's defender.

He cursed himself for allowing for Sioniz to escape but there was no time to dawdle on that.

He could hear the bombs rigged in the walls ticking rapidly to towards detonation.

He snatched Jason up in his arms and ran for the window, barely having leapt off the edge when a blast and rush of hot air burned his back and propelled him forward.

And then they were falling.

The Dark Knight twisted around to face the sky and shot a grappling hook around the neck of a stone gargoyle perched above a window on Sionis' building, the abrupt jolt and added weight of his son's body almost ripping his arm clean off.

He gave a yelp of pain, muffled by his clenched teeth, and fastened his grip tighter around Jason.

Chunks of burning debris started to rain down and Batman quickly began to swing them back and forth until he had the necessary momentum to safely land on the nearest ledge. The cape over his back was stinged and smoking, holes burned into many places, he was sure, but at least he'd managed to protect Jason from the fire Sionis had condemned him to die in.

At least he was alright and presently safe from that man, who'd done god knows what to him.

Batman suspected the mind-controlling techno-organic virus Sionis had been known to use was responsible for what he'd witnessed, just as he knew its effects were only temporary.

Regret and worry in his eyes hidden by the whites that covered them, he glanced towards Jason, still unconscious and held firmly against his broad chest, and began to wonder what the hell he had allowed the boy to dive headlong into.

Whatever it was, one thing was clear,  Roman Sionis would pay.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Once again, thank you, Nance. You've showered me in good — great, ideas again and I want to reach through your screen and hug you.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow, so many nice people leaving encouraging comments! Thank you and please keep at it, lord knows I need encouragement!

Sighing softly, Bruce rubbed his own hands against Jason's icy one, trying in vain to restore warmth to it. It was all he could do while his son slept, yet to awaken after being electrocuted last night, which Bruce just chalked up to extreme tiredness. He'd ran numerous tests just to be sure, however, and what he discovered instead was disturbing. There weren't any traces of the techno-organic virus he'd suspected had been used to control Jason's mind anywhere in his blood, only hints of a substance he was yet to identify. But the substance wasn't why Jason had behaved the way he did.

No. Bruce found something else.

 _Scars_.

Tens of scars, one atop another, covered Jason's entire body, and some were very recent or not yet healed. He'd discovered them when he had removed the grey Kevlar vest to treat the injuries his son had gained from both their strife and the office explosion. They were caused by knives, whips, fire, red-hot metal, boiling water, electrical currents, everything imaginable and some not even that. 

Bruce's blood froze before it began to bubble. 

He'd seen Jason's back before he went undercover and it hadn't been half this marred, bearing only the memory of the Joker's assault and a few less noticeable others. This was all Sionis's doing, every one from the past one and a half years.

Not only that, Jason's neck was peppered with circular black and maroon bruises that implied Sionis had had all kinds of uses for his son. 

If he could find the man, Black Mask would be in a body cast by now. Jason was Bruce's top priority right now, tracking the scumbag down was the second.

Again he sighed, watching Jason's chest gently rise and fall. Even in sleep he looked wounded. 

" I'm so sorry, Jason." Bruce finally said though the boy could not hear the apology. His voice trembled with the build-up of emotions and he gripped the smaller hand tighter. It was impossible not to think about the last time they did this, Jason had been dead, his small broken body lying limp in the arms of the father who could do nothing to help him.

Why did he always fail with this one Robin? Even in the wake of his death, Bruce still managed to let him down. 

" Master Bruce," the door creaked open and Alfred's aged face appeared in Bruce's peripheral vision. He relinquished hold of Jason's hand and turned in his seat to face the elderly butler, who was holding a tray with a mug and teapot. Some sort of food was there, too. 

" You should rest, you've been by the boy's side all night." Alfred said as he set the tray down on the nightstand and began pouring bitter black tea into a delicate porcelain china. He didn't add milk or sugar and handed it to Bruce.

" Why didn't I ever check on him, Alfred?" He asked more himself than Alfred, turning his saddened and guilt-stricken eyes on him. Alfred remembered the last time had he looked this way, it had been the night he brought home the second Robin's bleeding and burned body.

He would never forget the look of agony on Jason's still and dead face.

" Because he told you not to. You respected his wishes." He patiently explained, remembering as well as Bruce when Jason had practically screamed at his father that he wanted to be left alone and not constantly supervised like he was a child, and all because the Dark Knight had been monitoring his activities closely for fear of his safety. Jason had a temper and if he felt like someone underestimated him or didn't believe him to be capable of whatever task he was then attending, he would go out of his way to do it alone. Without help despite how badly he may need it.

" But I shouldn't have. I should have just gone with instinct and ignored him. He would be mad, but at least he wouldn't be....." He trailed off and waved his hand towards Jason. " This." 

" Sir, he may have been a child when you took him in, but that is not the case anymore. Jason makes his own choices and treating him as anything less than an adult would not help." 

Bruce barely listened, rather dwelling in self-loathing than venturing into the alien territory of not blaming himself for everything bad that happened. He took a small sip of the drink and winced at the sweetness, despite there being no additives in it.

He then gazed down at Jason, wishing like so many times before that their roles could be reversed. 

" Have you told Mr Harper that Jason has been located and is safe?" Alfred inquired, clasping his hands behind his back and standing by like a dutiful servant, but a servant didn't begin to encompass what he meant to every member of the Bat Clan.

" No, not yet." Haphazardly, Bruce swept Jason's snowy bangs out of his face while he couldn't help but darkly wonder how many times Mask had had a handful of his hair to control his movements. " I want to make sure he is actually safe before I contact Roy."

" Is that wise? He cares for Jason very much."

" I know. However, him rushing back here right now would not only endanger him and his daughter, but also Jason. Sionis will want him back, Alfred, and he'll use anyone or thing to do that."

Alfred nodded, understanding but not quite agreeing. He gathered up the tray in his hands again.

" If you don't intend on sleeping, Master Bruce, then at least let the boy rest. Your unwavering gaze is sure to give him nightmares." Frank as always, he departed the room and fully expected Bruce to follow, which he did after giving Jason one last lingering glance.

They were barely down the hall when they heard the scream.

 

* * *

 

When Jason woke up, everything was black. Blacker than Sionis's mask. He was blind. The first instinct was to rake his hands roughly over his eyes and search for what was covering them, but when nothing was there panic took over.

In his head, he was back in the lightless torture room with Pyg.

He screamed and started to tear at his now useless optics like a madman, thrashing so violently that his weight toppled sideways off the unfamiliar bed and he crashed onto the floor. It was cold and wooden, not what he knew or recognised. 

_Where was he?_

Jason scrambled across the alien space and hit a desk or nightstand or something, causing a lamp with a heavy porcelain stand to fall onto his head with a brutal wet smack. Pain receptors went off and he should have felt the impact, but he was too wired on the blindness to notice even when blood started to matter his hair.

By the sudden sound of it, a door slammed open and someone - some man - exclaimed his name. Although he might have, he forced himself into denying he recognised the voice to save himself from the shocks he would get if he remembered.

" Jason, calm down!" The voice went off again just as Jason began to blink back black dots and regain his sight. Strong hands took him and held him in a way that couldn't be Sionis, it was far too caring. The man was shushing him gently and stroking his hair, despite the blood that was now dirtying them both. The soft caress of his breath on Jason's neck felt like knives and fearfully, he dared to look up at the distraught black eyes that stared down at him.

" Br-" He almost said the name that was beyond his ken, when the crackling of electric whispered like a ghost by his hear and he refused to answer wrong.

He didn't know.

He didn't know.

He didn't know who this was. 

" Alfred, please get some medical supplies." Bruce asked the disquieted butler, drawing his son deeper in his arms and rocking him gently, as he would an infant. Jason was trembling like he'd woken from a terrible nightmare, making no move to stray from where he was being cradled, which was extremely unlike him. He _hated_ to be touched.

" Jason?" Bruce cupped his cheek lightly and brushed his thumb against his cheekbone. 

Jason knew better than to not respond to his name.

Not responding would get him his veins opened and two hours of waterlogging. 

" Ye -" his voice quivered, " yes, sir?"

Just then Alfred returned with a first aid kit, never allowing Bruce to give his utterly shocked response to how Jason addressed him as a superior.

" Here you are, Master Bruce." He handed it over, casting the boy one long and worried look, unseeing of the flurry of fragmented memories he set off in Jason's head with the sound of the name he wasn't allowed to know.

_Bruce, Batman, Bruce, Batman, Bruce, Batman, Bruce, Batman—_

The two went together. They fit like dual pieces of a puzzle.

 _Bruce, Batman, Bruce, Batman, Bruce, Batman_ — then he remembered, Bruce _was Batman_ and Batman was his enemy.

But he wasn't allowed to know who this man was.

It wasn't allowed.

Would he be punished for knowing even if he defeated his enemy?

Bruce relinquished his tight embrace on Jason and helped him up. The boy was staring at him with wide and uncertain eyes, weighing both his options.  Either one would end in a beating.

Either one would force Sir to punish him.

What was he going to do?

" Br-" Jason tried to say the name again but it weighed heavily on his tongue and burned like a hot iron with only the first two letters.

_'Who's this, kid? Now don't answer wrong.'_

With a sharp twist of his head, he shook the rotten voice out of his skull and barely heard what the other two men were saying to him.

" Jason - Jason, look at me, son," Bruce took his face in both hands and held it, aligning their gazes. Jason was trembling and a mixture of confusion and fear was swirling in his teal hues. Bruce couldn't tell what he was thinking but his mind was scrambled and broken. He saw then how completely Mask had destroyed his son. There was nothing left of him.

" You're okay, Jason." He said, trying to convince them both. " You're safe, you're-"

_Smack!_

Jason's fist caught him below the chin and snapped his head back in a painful arch, sending him flying back across the room until he crashed into Alfred. It was less than three seconds before Bruce looked up again, trying to lock his sights on Jason only to be met by an open window that's curtains billowed in the wait for an oncoming storm. 

And Jason was gone.

* * *

 

Jason had been gone for sixteen hours when Sionis had expected him to come running back after just the first. Running back like a puppy separated from its owner. 

 _Was it possible,_ he wondered, _that the Bat had somehow gotten through to him?_ _No._ _There's no way he undid seven months worth of conditioning in half a day._

But could Jason have chosen not to return or was he simply unable?

Whatever the case may be, Sionis had gone through the considerable effort to locate the one thing that would force his boy to return no matter what his predicament was. 

He leaned back in the chair of his penthouse office, swirling around the sweet golden contents of his whiskey glass and studying the freckled face of the man whose picture was attached to the corner of a thick file.

The photo had captured him grinning at something someone said to him, revealing his flawless white teeth. There was nothing fake about that smile. It sparkled purely in his emerald eyes. The tips of his scruffy orange hair reached his jaw, longer than Sionis generally preferred but he saw himself making an exception if the opportunity ever presented itself.

He wasn't as pretty as Jason but decent looking, nonetheless. 

He allowed for his eyes to wander from the photo to the basic info printed below in big block letters. 

**Name: Roy William Harper Jr.**

**Born: 5. 8. 1991.**

**Aliases: Speedy, Red Arrow, Arsenal.**

**Years active: 2004-2012.**

**Status: Retired.**

**Family: Roy Harper Sr. (deceased) Jim Harper (unknown) Jade Nguyen (alive) Lian Nguyen-Harper (alive).**

**Current residence: Gotham City.**

It hadn't been exactly easy to connect the name Sionis recalled Jason mumbling about in his drug induced delusion to an actual person, but his sources were certain this was who the disoriented man had meant. The second name he remembered was Lian and it was no coincidence that Harper had a child called that. 

Sources also reported Harper having skipped town recently and taken his daughter with him. If Jason hadn't returned by evening, tracking these two down wouldn't be difficult, especially since Sionis already knew they were in Star City.

The idea of his pathetic little misfit family under threat was sure to bring the boy crawling back to his feet.  

He flipped through pages filled with information that wasn't interesting to him, such as timelines and missions Harper had been part of and paused when he spotted an entire entry dedicated to his brat. 

**Lian Nguyen-Harper.**

She was six, it read, the offspring of an international assassin and former vigilante. What a controversy, he thought silently to himself, but hardly intriguing and perhaps that was because this was a normal child.

No powers. No traumas. Nothing entertaining whatsoever.

If it came to using her and her father as leverage, he would make sure to give her a few things to be traumatized over.

A hollow, hesitant knock dared to make itself heard against the wood of the door and a second later one of his henchmen stepped in, and to Sionis' mediocre delight, Jason was trailing behind him like a kid being taken to the principal's office. He was staring at the floor as he walked.

" Sorry to bother you, sir," the man began, " but we found Hood. You ordered him to be brought to you when he was located."

" I don't need to be reminded of what I ordered." Sionis sarcastically glowered. He dropped the file from his hand and into the brimming paper wastebasket by his desk, no longer needing, and beckoned for Jason to come over.

Still staring downward, he did.

" You can go." He waved the henchman in the direction of the entrance. He excused himself quickly and the door closed behind him with a loud bang, cutting off the light from the hallway and leaving them illuminated only by the fire crackling in the hearth. 

Sionis gave Jason a slow visual sweep over, ruby eyes lingering on his vacant face and the fresh graze on his temple that had oozed blood into his hair and mattered it. He wondered with Batman had really had the stones to hit his boy. If so, Sionis may have underestimated him.

" Orders, sir?" Jason half whispered, clearly in a vulnerable state of mind.

One wrong word, Sionis knew, and he could lose the progress he'd made with the boy.

He needed to play his cards right. He needed to be more than whatever affection the Bat had had the time to give him.

" Don't worry about orders, son," Sionis said, putting away his whiskey glass and joining Jason where he stood in the centre of the room.

He laid his hand on Jason's cheek more gently than he'd ever done and caressed his skin with his thumb, working in slow brushing motions.

" Are you alright? He didn't hurt you, did he?" Sionis moved a clotted lock of his white - currently pink - fringe to examine the ugly wound beneath. It wasn't a bad one, but it certainly looked like it would at least sting.

" Did he do this to you?"

Jason thought back to what had occurred. The lamp. The lamp fell on him.

" N - no, sir. It was an accident."

" _Jason_ ," Sionis said more firmly like he was insisting. " He did this to you, didn't he? You just don't remember."

Jason frowned. Not that he thought about it more, that was how it had happened. Batman had hit him. He now remembered the huge gloved hand coming down on him and striking a hard blow. 

" Yes, sir. He did." 

Sionis shook his head with an angered expression. " I'll make him pay for this, son. He had no right to hurt you, his quarrel is with me."

Before Jason could bravely inquire what they were fighting about, more specifically why he was involved, Sionis continued. 

" Any other injuries I should be aware of? Even small ones?"

" M - my sight-" he motioned to his eyes with a trembling gesture, "- It went black. Wasn't - wasn't working for a few minutes."

" Hmm." Sionis took his face in both hands and examined him more closely. " I'll talk to Doctor Hughes about it in the morning. But you can see fine now?"

Jason dipped his chin in a brisk nod. " Yes, sir." 

" That's good then. Don't lose sleep over it, Jason. I'll make sure everything is okay. Now wait here," he took a step back and headed for the bathroom. " I'll get some cloths and we can fix up your head." 

Jason watched him go, confused. Sir was never usually this caring.... maybe he was just relieved that he got away from Batman.

He seemed to be, at least.

He wasn't even angry that Jason hadn't killed the Dark Knight like he'd been ordered to.

Maybe he wasn't going to get a beating after all.

While he listened to water running in the other room, his gaze drifted absently across the floor and landed on the trashcan that was overflowing with crumpled up paper balls and one thick file that came close to interesting him.

He studied it more, catching a glimpse of a shade of red sticking from beneath the pages, part of a photograph he guessed. The particular hue was familiar to him but before he could investigate further, Sionis returned with a cloth he'd dampened in the sink.

Jason immediately withdrew his attention from the picture.

" Come into the bedroom, son, sit down." Sionis instructed, already on his way there. Jason really didn't want to go in there, but he also knew choices weren't a luxury he possessed. 

A tall lamp standing in the corner of the room was the only thing that lit up the dark space, making it sort of cosy, if the place where he had been raped numerous times could be considered cosy, that is. 

_No._

Sir had told him not to call it that.  It was misleading. Like Sir had said, if he didn't want it he only needed to say so. And it's not like Jason couldn't fight him off if he wanted to.

Sionis sat him down on the bed and began tenderly dabbing at the graze with the cloth, carefully working to remove every flake of dry blood.

" He called me 'son'," Jason abruptly told him, his mind absently drifting back to the confrontation. Sionis looked down at him, a displeased expression forming on his leathery black features. 

" He said I was safe with him. I think.... he cared about me."

Sionis's fist tightened its hold around the rag to stop himself backhanding Jason for daring to think for himself and make assumptions, but if he broke character now he would be providing more fuel for the boy's theory. 

" He lied to you, Jason. He's a manipulative bastard." He explained as he put the cloth away and sat next to him.

" _I_   can keep you safe. _I_ care about you. Not him. Remember who hurt you and who saved you from months of torture? Did he ever come? Were you ever safe with him?"

Jason tried lowering his gaze but the set way Sionis held it didn't let him.

" No, sir." 

" He wants to destroy you, son. Hurt you. But he can't if you don't believe his lies." 

" Yes, sir."

Sionis caressed his hair and smiled warmly, actually hurting himself with the falsity of it.

" Good, lad. I know it's difficult to drown him out, but if you do everything I tell you, I can protect you."

" Yes, sir." Jason looked at the wall past his shoulder but returned his eyes to Sionis' face near instantly. " Sir?"

" Yes, Jason?"

" D - do you mind if we _don't_.... tonight?"

Sionis's jaw set and his teeth ground together, but he made himself smile again and nod. Pretending to care about the brat was exhausting, especially when it had to be convincing and now he was even thinking that he gave a crap about what he wanted. 

" Whatever you want, son. You look like you need some sleep, anyway."

Except Jason didn't sleep, even despite his lead-lined eyes. He laid awake through the night, on his side with Sionis's body around his own and an arm over his waist keeping him there.

He wasn't sure Sionis was asleep and he didn't dare take a look, best just to remain still until the dawn came. 

_" He wants to destroy you, son. Hurt you."_

_" You're okay, Jason. You're safe, you're-"_

_" He's the one who hurt you and the one who put you in that room with Pyg. I saved you from there, remember?"_

_" Jason - Jason, look at me, son."_

_" He lied to you, Jason."_

_" Who's this, kid?_ **_Don't_ ** _answer wrong."_

Groaning, he squeezed his eyes shut against the orchestra of voices that went on repeat through his head, all overlapping one another.  It was impossible, but every statement seemed like the truth to him, even the ones that conflicted with the others.  

How was it that everyone who swore they loved him said the other person didn't and was lying?

But as he thought about who may truly mean what they said, his mind unwillingly drifted back to that red hue in the trashed file.   
   

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's not that Jason doesn't remember Bruce, but it's a psychological thing where he expects to be hurt if he admits that he does in fact recognise him and therefore denies himself even saying his name in his mind. If you deny something hard enough it can become your reality (I should know, I constantly tell myself my life is going to go somewhere)


	6. Chapter 6

Normally bubbly and almost overbearingly sweet, Dick Grayson was a fiery force of nature when family was concerned. Lord help the unlucky bastard who hurt the people he cared about because he was going to hunt them down and make them cry blood.

That's why Dick had been appalled when he heard what Black Mask had done to Jason and that Bruce hadn't even gone after him when he vanished.

The second Alfred explained the situation through the phone, Dick was on his motorcycle and speeding out of Blüdhaven towards the hell-hole called Gotham.

During the whole half hour drive, he did nothing but stress about his little brother and vividly imagine a locked room, ten minutes, his escrima sticks, himself, and Roman Sionis, all alone at once.  

When he arrived at Wayne Manor, he'd already worked himself up into an aggravated firestorm ready to take the wrath of Nightwing to Sionis's front step. He didn't knock on the manor door, just marched straight in and into the Batcave. He hadn't even noticed he was shaking with anger until he was standing a foot away from Bruce, running several programmes on the many computers at once. 

" How could you not go after him, Bruce?" Dick demanded venomously, his crystalline blue eyes spitting burning hot embers at his father figure. 

Bruce stopped what he was doing on the second he spoke and rose to face his eldest son, coming to stand a few inches taller than him.

" He's terrified of me, Dick, and he doesn't trust me. If I went after him now, it would only make him more eager to return to Mask's arms."

" Don't say it like that," Dick put up a hand to stop him and bore the embodiment of repulsion on his face. " You make it sound like he's got a choice."

Bruce sighed. " Fine. It will scare him. _I_ would scare him. He needs someone he won't see as a threat; you."

" I approve this plan, Bruce. I'm gonna make Sionis-"

" You can't go in guns blazing, Dick. Don't be stupid, Jason could get hurt in the crossfire."

His father figure put an abrupt stop to his plans of tearing the place to the ground, but he did see the problem in it. As much as he wanted to make Sionis hurt,  he wasn't risking Jason's life.

" Then what do you suggest? Do we wait for Sionis to send him on a mission again? He won't, Bruce. He'll be careful now. Keep Jason close to his side until he thinks the danger is over."

" I know, Dick." Bruce returned to the chair in front of the monitors and pulled up every blueprint they had on each of Sionis's residences in Gotham City.

They ranged into the tens and after his office was compromised, he could be keeping Jason at any one of them.

But if he was smart, he was no longer even in the city. However, Roman Sionis didn't run from anyone, Bruce knew, so the latter wasn't even a possibility. But that wasn't a bad thing. It meant they had fewer places to look for Jason.

" We need to check each of these buildings individually. If Jason is located, do not engage in a fight with him unless it's to disable. And Mask stays alive."

" Right." He nodded solemnly, staring at the computer screen and its blinding artificial light.

" I'm serious, Dick. He's going to pay for what he's done, but not with his life."

Dick's glare burned holes into Bruce's back, the arms folded across the chest normally covered by a blue V tightening so that his shoulder cracked and his fingers dug into his biceps.

" Bruce, he tortured your son and brainwashed him into being his own private soldier/sex doll. Doesn't he deserve more than a cosy little cell at Blackgate?" 

" Jason is our priority, not playing judge, jury and executioner. We find him first, worry about the rest later. Got it?"

Although he hated agreeing with this, Dick nodded, focussing all his attention on helping his little brother and when he was safe in their arms, then and only then would he rip the bastard Sionis limb from limb and Colombian necktie his ass. 

" Gimme some coordinates and I'll get started on checking those places out." Dick said, submitting to the best and only plan they had right now.

As Bruce forwarded them to the navigator in his bike, he stared at the ground, at a loss in a sea of a million questions.

What was that monster doing to Jason right now?

Beating him, warping his perception, or forcing himself on top of him?

Every possibility made him sick to his stomach.

 _Little Wing_ , he internally whispered, _how long has this been happening to you?_

But more importantly, why didn't he ask for help before it was too late?

* * *

 

_Red Hood was hot on the heels of a truck zooming down the highway that lead out of Gotham, his motorcycle effortlessly weaving through traffic with sharp leans at a speed that turned cars to mere blurs of colour in the corner of his eye. Through the slits in his helmet, he watched the back of the careering vehicle approach startlingly fast, the mission the only thing on his mind._

_'Your top priority is catching the bastards who think they can skim money off me. Bring them back alive so I can make them hurt.'_

_The men inside the truck were panicking, Red Hood could practically taste their fear laid out thickly in the air. Were they not gangbangers he would regret having to turn them over to Black Mask and their inevitably cruel demises._

_'We make our own beds,' Bruce used to say, ' we can't complain when we're made to sleep in them.'_

_He pulled up next to them, switching his bike onto auto-driver and standing up in the saddle, swaying only a fraction from the velocity before bending his knees and leaping up to catch the corner of the cab's roof. The driver shoved a gun into the arms of the man next to him and ordered him to shoot their stowaway._

_Hood barely pulled himself onto the roof before a myriad of ammunition burst through the window, one scraping his calf and barely missing causing some serious damage. He hissed in pain but was too wired into action mode to care much about the slick oily blood beginning to stain his jeans._

_The only thing that mattered was the mission._

_They were firing through the roof now, bullets flying upward from all around him. Red Hood's heel crashed through the roof window, thrusting his arm through the broken glass and wrapping a handful of the driver's collar around his fist. With one swift yank, he had the man out and hurled him into the ditch on the side of the road with a long scream from him. The bushes and shrubbery would break his fall and spare his life for Black Mask's judgement._

_Poor bastard._

_The second gangbanger suddenly grew a set and latched onto the wheel, giving it a sharp turn that sent Jason near flying off the veering vehicle, the only thing that saved him being the door handle he just barely caught, but hanging near the window threw him straight into the line of fire._

_And the other man noticed that too._

_He swung the gun on Jason and pulled back on the trigger, giving him less than a second to make the choice that could get him killed one way or another. He decided to take the fall and impact instead of the hollow point to the gut and released his hold. He knew it was a terrible idea but none the worse than getting shot._

_The last thing he remembered before the hard wet smack of hitting the asphalt was the wild rush of air through his hair._

* * *

_Jason came around to an anvil crushing his skull, or at least that's what felt like was happening._

_He shifted and tried to roll onto his side, but regretted it when pain flared up in so many places it was impossible to name them all. With a groan that turned into a whimper, he miserably sank back into the soft mattress beneath him and struggled to push his eyelids open instead._

_He'd never actually been in this room, but he knew it was Sionis's on-site med bay, and there was no one around._

_Just him and the darkness._

_An IV was connected to the inside of his elbow and bandages and gauze crisscrossed his chest and upper left arm. Someone had even cut away the leg of his jeans to stitch up the bullet wound._

_The memory of standing on the truck one minute then hitting the asphalt in the next came back to him like a firestorm, telling him exactly why he was here._

_He'd always taken great care to patch himself up if he needed it because he didn't trust Sionis or his doctors, but it seemed this time he'd been too wounded to even be awake when they brought him back here._

_Jason sighed and closed his eyes again, too tired to move. Too tired to think. Too tired to do anything but rest for a few hours, his smashed up body sure as hell needed it._

* * *

 

_It may have been any amount of time that ranged from hours to minutes, Jason's delirious mind wasn't sure, when the door creaked open and a broad-shouldered silhouette appeared against the light cast from the hallway._

_Jason tried to open his eyes to see who it was but the weight on his head didn't allow him to, in fact, he barely made out the noise as the person closed the door with a muffled click and pattered across the room to him._

_He may not have seen their face but he recognised those footfalls._

_" What are you doing here, boss?" Jason asked apathetically, trying to prop himself up on his elbows and appear as respectful as his job as infiltrator demanded. Fuck, he couldn't wait to be done with Mask._

_" I heard you were hurt on the last mission." Sionis's sinister voice came through his mask, sounding right next to Jason's bedside. Knowing he didn't care about the actual extent of damage, Jason kept his answer vague._

_" 'S just a scratch. I'll be back in the field by morning."_

_" Is that so?" The tension in the room shifted with those words from taut to suffocating. Jason looked towards him to see what he was thinking but had barely moved his head when Sionis's hand lunged over and grabbed him by the hair._

_Jason was hardwired to responding to pain - sudden or gradual - with fighting back, but his broken bones and the strength he hadn't imagined Sionis possessed kept him down and forced him onto his stomach._

_" Wh - what are you doing?" He gasped, face pushed into the covers and an iron hold keeping it there. Every injury flared up a thousand-fold as Sionis's weight crushed him and he gave a muffled cry of pain. He was touching him. Grabbing him._

_" Just stay down, son. Don't worry about a thing." Somehow his voice was almost reassuring as he pinned Jason's arm behind his back with his spare hand and pressed down on his lower back with his knee, savouring the wonderful crack from his vertebrae and whimper that came along with it._

_" Get off me!"_

_Jason thrashed from side to side but remained powerless against the man who forced himself on top of him._

_Bei_ _ng vulnerable, defenceless, he tried to stop it from dragging him back to the traumatic memories of being bound on a cold warehouse floor but every sensation and burst of pain came back like a freight train and his struggling intensified to the point where he was hurting himself more than Sionis was._

_" Fucking hell! Getoffme!!" He was screaming by now, voice becoming raw from the aggression of his shouts, although he seemed to be calling out to someone else._

_Sionis barely wondered what sort of a gander the boy's mind had taken when he began stripping him and taking what he'd always wanted. In the end, it had all come down to the one moment where Red Hood was too weak to defend himself._

_" Shh," Sionis soothed in such a way that would become extremely familiar to Jason. " Don't scream, baby, don't scream. It'll all be over soon."_

 

* * *

 

Jason stared at the fistful of sheet he had in his grasp, twisting it around his hand as Sionis spoke to Doctor Hughes in the other room, dismissing him like he was a little child who wasn't allowed to hear the adults conversing.

They'd left him sitting in the same room - on the same bed, actually - as where Sionis first took him against his will.

He wondered if it was some sort of cruel reminder of his place as he rubbed at his jaw, aching from how roughly his mouth had been used earlier that morning.

Sure enough, Sionis had shown him enough kindness not to touch him last night, but that hadn't applied to when the sun came up and just for respecting his wishes before, Jason had complied wordlessly. 

_'Do exactly as I say, and I can protect you.'_

And just like Sionis had said, it was the least Jason could do for him.

 

* * *

 

" Recall when I told you if it went wrong, it would go really wrong?" Doctor Hughes said, holding a clipboard in both his hands as he stood facing his cross-armed boss.

Sionis did not look happy and his expression could nearly be mistaken for him caring about Jason's wellbeing. 

" Well, this is it going really wrong."

" Elaborate, you twit. What's wrong with him?" He pinched the bridge of his nose through his mask as he made the demand. He could feel the early tingling of one bitch of a migraine brewing in his skull. 

" The techno-organic matter we infused with his DNA was experimental and it worked for surprisingly long, but it's beginning to malfunction. The lapses of vision are just the beginning, soon he'll lose his ability to heal fast and the old injuries will come back with a vengeance. We knew about this risk, sir."

Sionis wearily glanced at Jason through the one-way mirror. He'd put so much work and money into the boy that the thought of losing him was enough on its own to amp up the potency of his migraine.

Jason was a valuable soldier and desirable warmth in his bed, he hadn't even considered a future where those two things may not be at his disposal.

He hated to lose anything.

" Will he die?"

" Possibly not, sir, but he certainly won't be as... capable. Scans showed a majority of the brain damage was healed by the serum but many other things weren't. For example, the extensive nerve damage in his right leg? That will come back."

" How long?"

" Weeks. A month at the most."

Sionis's mood darkened with the prediction.

" And there's nothing you can do?"

" Afraid not, sir." Doctor Hughes was genuinely apologetic, saddened to watch such an asset slowly become worthless to their cause. The months of work and millions of dollars inevitably going to waste.

" He won't be of any use to you then, sir. I recommend immediate termination of the subject."

Sionis thought, frowning behind the protection of his mask and considering purpose he could yet glean out of the boy, both for pleasure and otherwise.

The loss would be huge, but he would find someone to replace Jason within hours. 

 _Maybe_ , he thought with a wicked internal smile and sinister plans for the future, _Jason's sweetheart Roy Harper would do the trick._

Sort of add insult to injury and mess with the boy even after death.

Every man could be broken, after all, remoulded for new purposes and slaughtering that snivelling little brat of Harper's would certainly make a dent, especially if those same hands that took her life were the ones that forced his precious Jason onto his knees countless times.

He realised he might actually get more out of Jason's death than his life. Even so, best to use him to his full potential before letting him go.

" We wait until he's completely useless, then we kill him." He finally announced and the doctor nodded, wholly agreeing because it was the smart thing to do with Sionis.

" Yes, sir."

 

* * *

 

Jason's head snapped up when Sionis returned and he instantly did not trust the expression on the man's face, something about it sent shivers down his spine, yet he still followed him like an obedient dog when he was beckoned to.

He fell into step with the masked man as they walked, watching him expectantly in the terrible wait for any news regarding how his vision blacked yesterday.

But Sionis kept him waiting thoughtlessly until they reached his office and he'd poured himself a glass of whiskey. 

He was leaning against the desk, staring at Jason through the slits in his mask, surely grinning behind it as he enjoyed the boy's nervousness.

" You want to know what Hughes said, don't you?"

Jason nodded. " Yes, sir."

" It's not good news, I'm afraid, son. When you were captured by Batman, he did something to you, now it's breaking you." Sionis explained as nonchalantly as if he were simply reading a shopping list.

He swirled his drink around as he spoke.

" W - what?" He gave a small gasp, barely believing that despite everything he'd been told, the man who cradled him so tenderly would do something like that to him. 

" You heard me, boy. He injected you with something that's causing massive system failure, and it won't be long before you're useless to me."

Jason tried to stammer out something incoherent, shocked and terrified.

He didn't want to be useless to Sir, what would he do then?

His only purpose for living was to make good on every command and every order, to make it up to Sionis for saving him from Pyg. 

" Pl - please, sir. Isn't there anything I can do you for you while I still can? _Anything_?" He practically pleaded, desperation that made Sionis stir with merriment alight in his wide teal eyes. 

" Kill the Batman, son. Kill him and make me proud."

" B - but, sir, I couldn't beat him l -  last time and this time I'm not even on top of my game." Jason tried and failed to see the angle here.

" Not my problem, kiddo." Sionis uncaringly said, throwing his head back and downing his whiskey in one gulp. He slammed the glass down on the tabletop.

"  You said you wanted to do something for me, now figure out how you're going to do it and bring me the Bat's head." Sionis approached him with every word, until the point when they were an inch apart and Jason couldn't help but swallow back some of his extensive nervousness.

Jason couldn't tell if he was serious about the order or not. He wasn't acting very serious, which was quite unlike him.

" Just try not to get killed, son."

No matter the gentleness of it, his touch was somehow cold and cruel as it swept a lock of his hair out of his face and behind his ear. Whatever had been there last night, whatever trace of actual concern for him, was gone.

Or maybe it had never been there.

Jason flinched and drew a small quick breath when he was kissed harshly on the lips and dipped like they were dancing.

Not that the gesture was deserving of such a delicate description, in truth, Sionis bent his spine back until his arm around his waist was the only thing keeping him from falling. A sort of reminder that without Sionis's hold, Jason would hit the ground.

" Mmh," Sionis licked his lips behind his mask once he released the boy, eyeing him greedily.

" I'm gonna miss how you taste, kiddo. But hopefully," he was already leaving Jason by his lonesome in the room as he added the last, " your Roy will same fire you used to."

That's when his heart stopped and he froze. Jason watched the man's retreating back with wide eyes.

_Roy._

Sionis mentioned Roy.

He was going to replace Jason with Roy.

But Roy and Lian were both dead. He'd seen it in his head and behind his eyes so many times he had done everything not to let his mind stray back to their memory.

_" Jason, what's wrong? What happened to you?"_

_" Nothing." He pushed Roy's hands away and put on a difficult to attain 'good face'. " Nothing, sorry. I'm just being stupid and jumpy. Haven't slept a lot lately."_

_" Is that it? Why not take a nap while you're here? It's probably a whole lot more peaceful than camping out at Mask's."_

Jason gasped and stumbled back against the wall. Mental images and voices from long ago zipped through his head, like the floodgates he'd forced closed were now bursting with a vengeance.

_" I'm worried about you. This whole this is going as planned but it's still taking a serious toll on you."_

He remembered when Roy said that. It was on the day before... Before...

Jason stilled, lifting his face from his hands and staring at the red-carpeted office floor and the large stain of the slightly darker shade of crimson on it that he had never taken much interest in.

_His whole world was met with a searing slice of pain and he caught a glimpse of the silvery blade of his knife sailing through his stomach with a spray of blood._

Jason's eyes were held captive by the site, every mangled and warped piece of his mind reconnecting with the truth.

Roy loving him, Pyg ripping him to pieces, and then finally, Sionis delivering the blow that would destroy him.

He'd pushed him down, forced him to be his sex toy, tortured him, made him think his family was dead, remoulded him into his perfect little soldier, and now...

Now he wanted to hurt his family.

Not a chance in fucking hell.

* * *

 

He barely knew where to go anymore, but Jason ran with his eyes closed, following his heart's yearning like a compass. He bumped into several people and shoved past the rest, not caring for apologies or the dark glowers he was given.

He needed to keep running before Mask realised he wasn't off killing Bruce. His footsteps pounded hard against the asphalt and were nothing out of the ordinary until he was in the hall outside Roy's apartment.

That's when his leg, the right one, was stabbed with an invisible dagger and buckled beneath him.

Jason caught himself against the wall and continued dragging himself towards the door, barely caring how his limbs could just about support him. He could worry about himself when he knew Roy and Lian were safe.

Every hallucination he'd had of this moment went through his head, every time he opened the door and found them dead, and he was almost too scared to go in.

 _It was a nightmare, they were all nightmares_ , Jason kept repeating as he limped in, allowing himself access with the spare key Roy had hidden beneath the neighbour's doormat.

He closed the door behind him and searched the house, room to room, but they were gone. As distressed as the discovery made him, he took comfort in the fact that it looked like they had just gone out and not been captured.

Lian had even left her Everest-doll on the couch.

Smiling sadly, he took it and held it to his face as he sank into the corner of the couch, inhaling the soft scent of Lian's strawberry shampoo that she had probably used to scrub the animal clean with without her father's knowledge.

Sensation was returning to his leg but instead of rejoicing in that, all he could do to keep from crying was to remind himself that when they got back, it would have to look like he was fine. He didn't want to scare Lian, but he had to tell Roy everything when they were alone. Roy had to know why he had been gone for so long.

Maybe he would find it in his heart to at least understand.

Although he'd sworn he wouldn't, tears began escaping from beneath his lashes and the small sobs and shudders were unavoidable.

He tried to not drown in the trainwreck his life now was while he waited.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Yay! Dick is here! And poor, poor Jaybird. I hate myself for doing this to him. Go on, hate me too.
> 
> I hope 4K words in three days is makes up for destroying your guys' hearts.


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Shit gets real.

_Thank god for Grayson's consideration,_ Roy thought, because Batman sure as hell never would have told him they found Jason.

Dick said he'd been tortured, brainwashed, and.... and all this while he and Roy were in the same city.

He never saved Jason.

He never knew Jason needed saving.

The thought that he was getting the skin whipped off his back a few kilometres away while Roy was tucking his daughter into bed made him sick.

He pressed his foot down harder on the gas and out of habit, his eyes darted to the rear-view mirror, expecting to see Lian playing with her Barbie dolls before he remembered he'd left her with Oliver back in Star City.

Instead, the quiver and folded bow he hadn't picked up since he decided he was going to do right by Lian, rested under a quilt on the backseats, hidden but at hand's reach.

Grimly, his jaw set and he turned his sights back on the road ahead, Gotham City looming just beyond the horizon like a dark storm cloud, waiting to unleash a flood of rain and lightning. There was something bad lingering in the air, so heavy he could taste it, and were it not for Jason, he would not be coming back at all.

All he could do was hope and pray Jason had gone back home after he left the mansion. His brain may have been scrambled, but surely he would go somewhere he knew was safe?

Although with Mask's goons looking for him, the security of their apartment was debatable.

That didn't matter, though. Roy didn't care if he had to fight a thousand men to get to him, if he had to go to the heart of Sionis's fortified HQ or even hell itself, he would find Jason and bring him home.

 

* * *

 

 _"_ _You'd do anything for me, huh, ginger?" Jason's eyes met his from across the room and he smiled mischievously, as if completely unaware of the fact that he was covered head-to-toe in enemy blood. Roy shouldered his bow after he fired the last arrow and added one more soul to the sea of corpses strewn out across the floor._

_" Pretty much, babe. But this better be the last time I gotta save your ass from a fucking gangbanger shootout." The archer warned with an expression as serious as he could muster, but it was impossible to forgo that careless smirk on his partner's lips. He resisted the tugging at the corners of his mouth but it was a struggle he quickly lost._

_Damn Jason and his award-winning grin._

_" If I said it was the last time, would you believe me?" He inquired as he crept, rather pranced, over, stepping over the bodies of men impaled with arrow shafts and hit by a master gunslinger's marksmanship. By his nonchalant nature, one might almost think Jason didn't know how close he was to death before Roy burst in, a bow-wielding force of nature ready to risk his life for his darling._

_" Nope." He earnestly replied, falling into step with Jason and they walked away side by side. Roy imagined a normal couple would be strolling out of the movies or a nice restaurant as casually as they left the scene of a genocide._

_" Then I won't lie to you, ginger. I give it a week at most before we're doing this again."_

_" You know you're reckless as fuck, right, Jason?" Roy dryly observed the obvious, although he would admit there was a certain charm to his careless nature. Even before he'd taken his hood off to let Roy see his pretty face, his attitude had been alluring to the archer. It was what he fell for long before his looks._

_" People are only careful if they've got something to lose. What've we got to lose? Kids? A family? Nada, on my part and last time I checked, that's the case with you, too." Jason explained his very tunnel-visioned point of view as they rounded a corner into an alley and continued down it. Their safe house was just up ahead._

_Roy fell silent after Jason's statements, thinking._

_He hadn't yet, but soon Roy needed to tell Jason about the toddler his former bride had left on his doorstep. It was honestly amazing he'd managed to keep her existence from Jason for this long. Jason, who was was a meagre eighteen-years-old, wouldn't want to be in a relationship that involved kids. That's not what he signed up for. And Roy needed him in his life too much to risk losing him._

_" I still think we need to be careful, Jay."_

_" Argh, you've gotten boring." Jason complained as they entered the dark interior of the small safe house. Mouldy plaster was falling off the walls in chunks and revealing the red brickwork beneath. There was one intact window in the whole place, the rest were boarded up and the air was damp, hardly the place Roy could bring Lian to, so once again he was grateful Ollie was able to look after her for awhile._

_Jason dumped his gear onto the floor and plopped down on the couch with a deep sigh, tipping his head back and closing his eyes. Roy put his bow and quiver away more carefully than his significant other ever would his own equipment, and joined him._

_He eyed Jason and raised a carroty brow, studying him. He was tired, despite how full of energy he'd just seemed._

_" You okay, babe?"_

_" Yepperdidoo," he muttered uncharacteristic verbal atrocity, cementing the fact that he wasn't quite in his A-game. His arms were slung over the back of the couch and his chest gently rising and falling. If Roy didn't know he acted bipolar from time to time, the sudden shift in his mood would have been more worrying than it was._

_" C'mere." Roy's fingers curled around his holster and pulled him towards himself. Jason roused himself enough to willingly come and settled on his lap, straddling his legs with his own while Roy's hands found their perch on his hips._

_" You're sure you're okay?" He asked, staring into Jason's eyes. There was definitely something pressing on his heart. He hadn't even initiated a make-out session like he always did when there something he didn't want to talk about._

_" Have I ever told you I love you?" He asked out of the blue, like it was something Roy didn't already know._

_Confused, the archer merely blinked, once, twice._

_" Uh,  yeah. What's this about?"_

_" Nothin', just letting you know, that no matter what, I'd never leave you. I know that because you think I'm a kid, I can't handle commitment."_

_Roy didn't know how, but he swore Jason had found out about Lian_ _or at least_ , _he knew there was something Roy was keeping from him._

_" I don't think that, but you're still so young... I don't want to burden you with certain aspects of my life."_

_" Burden?" Jason's scoffed and rolled his eyes at such a ridiculous idea. " I wake you up every night with my fucking nightmares and keep you on your toes at day because you never know when I'm gonna do something really fucking dumb, so if we're talking about burdens here..."_

_Roy smiled and he continued._

_" If there's ever something you want to tell me, I can take it. And since I'm such a fucked up mess, do you really think I can afford to leave the one person who thinks I'm redeemable?"_

_Roy cupped the back of his head with his hand and drew him in for a kiss, smiling through it and Jason's pulse against him. A wave of overwhelming love for the younger man swept over him and there were no words invented that could describe what Jason was to him._

_" Thanks, babe." He mumbled into his mouth. " I don't know what I'd do without you."_

 

* * *

 

Well, now he was having to find out. Roy tried not to linger on the memory because it would make him sad when he needed to be angry. The leather cover of the wheel scrunched as his white-knuckled grip tightened.

He _wanted_ to be angry.

What Sionis had done to Jason.... It made his blood boil and for every second Roy didn't have his arms around Jason to comfort him, was like a knife in his heart.

 _I should never have let him go,_ he kept thinking, _I should have made him st-_

_BANG!_

Something careered into the side of his car and Roy jerked forward, seat belt digging into his flesh.

The sound of metal bending and snapping tore through the already tense air. It erupted into a horrifying screech. Glass shattered and everything seemed to twist and contort.

Powerless against this sudden and unholy impact, his car rolled several times across the highway. Everything built up until the noise was the only thing left and suddenly it was gone.

*

Jason awoke with no recollection of ever falling asleep, and when his eyes met the room, he thought he was still dreaming.

One of Pyg's horrible hallucinations that would end with him a trembling mess.

A flash of blue and black in the corner of his peripheral vision got him on edge and he tensed himself defensively, ready for a fight.

That didn't belong in the nightmare. It was a new threat. A new threat he didn't yet know how to battle. 

A sickeningly realistic delusion of Nightwing stepped from the shadows, hands raised and his eyes behind his domino mask glistening with concern.

The familiar face made Jason's stomach twist.

" It's okay, Jason. It's me, Dick." His voice attempted to be soothing but it was clear by the tremor, that something about Jason scared him.

It was how he saw none of his little brother in teal eyes that were once familiar.

" You're not real," Jason hissed, staring at him wearily. He was poised for combat, hunched over like a beaten and cornered animal.

Bruce hadn't told Dick what a terrible state he was in. He was seriously favouring his left side and by the heavy bruising on the side of his face, that piece of shit Sionis had recently hit him.

Dick almost left then and there to kill the man.

" You - you're not real." He faintly repeated, as if his sanity depended on being right.

" I'm real, Jay. It's me, your brother." Dick took a step towards him and in turn, Jason took one back.

There was nothing left in one piece in his eyes.

Everything was broken.

" No, no, no. You - _you're_ ju - just another hallucination." His voice had transformed into a wounded whimper and he backed into a corner, allowing for his back to slide down it until he was on the floor. He drew his knees to his chest and hugged them tight, white on black hair hiding his face from Dick, but Dick didn't need to see his expression to know the whirlwind of shattered and mixed emotions going through him.

" I'm not a hallucination, Little Wing." Dick removed his mask and threw it aside. He knelt a few feet from Jason, extending his hand and carefully brushing his dark curls aside.

His hand was shaking with the effort it took to be as gentle as a summer breeze, afraid that pressure of any kind would break him.

" Ple - please go a - away." Jason pleaded into his knees, the heavy strain of tears weighing on his every word.

" I - I need you t - to go. _Please_."

" I'm not leaving you alone, Jason." Dick cupped his cheeks with both hands and their gazes interlocked, one wide and hurt, the other seconds away from tearing up for everything that had happened to his brother. Everything he had once again failed to save him from.

" You're not alone any more."

With that everything Jason had been forcing back gave way and he said something that was barely more than a whisper,

" Dick?"

Dick felt his heart lift and he nodded with a gentle smile. " Yeah, it's me." He sounded relieved. 

For what were only seconds, Jason stared at him before returning his head into the shaking cradle of his hands. His fingers curled into hooks and dug into his scalp.

" I'm sorry, Dick. I'm so sorry." His shoulders wracked with tears his brother never imagined the feared Red Hood to be shedding. Dick, momentarily frozen in shock, reached out and pulled Jason into a comforting embrace, wrapping his arms around him securely. Before long he could feel his neck dampening with salty fluid.

" There's nothing to be sorry about, Jaybird." Dick soothed, smoothening his hair back as he cried into his shoulder. He kept his arms around him, protectively and wanted to safeguard his baby brother from the world. 

" I - I let him do this to me -" Jason stammered heartbreakingly, strands of his hair sticking to the adhesive rivers down his cheeks. 

" No, no. This wasn't your fault, Jay," Dick tried to keep the heavy weight of sadness from his voice, but every syllable from his mouth was as an anchor.

How could Jason even think himself responsible?

" Black Mask did this - all of this, to you. Bruce, Alfred, Roy, me, Lian, we're going to help you, Jason." Jason lowered his head, and Dick dared to kiss the top of his black mop of curls and he stilled, finally allowing his muscles out of their tensed up state. Everything except Jason's small ragged breaths fell into silence. 

Even then when everything should have been right, when Dick had his brother safe in his arms, something in Gotham stirred in a deep unrest.  

* * *

 

" How did you f - find me?" Jason asked quietly and stared out of the Batmobile window at the dozens of dead looking lights twinkling in the gloom.

Somewhere, a police siren screeched.

Somewhere, gunshots were fired.

Somewhere, someone died.

Dick glanced over at him from the road ahead.

" Roy told me to look at you guys's apartment. He left Lian with Oliver so he can come find you, Little Wing."

" Roy?" The name appeared to awaken Jason from his far-off mind state. It seemed to set alight a fragment or sparkle in his eyes that was almost considerable as life. 

" W - where is he?" Jason was both anxious and desperate. He needed Roy's warmth against his skin and the soothing sound of his voice in his ears, but how could he face the man he loved after everything Sionis had done?

Every degrading, horrific thing he had suffered made him want to cave within himself from shame and Roy didn't need to see him like that.

He _couldn't_ see him like that. 

" En route." 

" C - could you call him, please? I wan... wanna see if he's okay." 

Dick didn't comment on how Jason stammered and the way his sentences cut off midway, which they never used to.

He'd always spoken confident and arrogant. 

" I'll do that now." 

The communicator on the instrument board clicked on and Dick connected the call to Roy, waiting as it rang too loudly through the eerily noiseless car. The engine roared and the sounds of the city were deafening, but all Jason could fixate on was that Roy wasn't picking up. 

Seconds or minutes, however much time it was, but it was too long.

" Maybe he can't talk right now, Jay." Dick frowned at the communicator, thinking it was odd that Roy wasn't answering when he had his phone glued to his hand in the wait for news about Jason.

But, of course, he didn't want Jason to think anything was the matter.

But he wasn't stupid. Never had been.

" Sir's got him." Jason breathed, staring eyes wide into nothingness. There was a tremble in his lips. 

" No, no he doesn't. He's probably just driving through a tunnel or something, somewhere he can't get signal." Dick tried to reassure him, _convince_ him, but he felt it, too.

A brewing tension before a crack of lightning.

" He said he was - was gonna replace me with Roy, Dick. He's got Roy. I - I know he does."

Dread, horror, fear, anger. All those emotions stood out boldly on his feature, none diluted. Nothing was mixed.

Dick felt an inward tug of hope for his brother despite the dire nature of the situation. He looked something like himself for a hair's breadth. But he didn't savour that for long, however, knowing what Roy would be in for with Sionis. 

And it was all because he wanted Jason, like a brattish child whose favourite doll was taken away. 

" We need to get back to the cave, form a plan. B will help and don't argue me on that, Jason, without him getting within six feet of Sionis will be impossible."

Jason didn't raise an argument, rubbing at his aching leg as splinters of pain fragmented through the muscles again. His eyes were dark fire and the blade of his knife yearned for blood. Sionis had done some awful things to him, but only now had he crossed the line.

" It's not impossible for me." He whispered.

* * *

 

" What the hell happened to his arm?" Sionis demanded, in vague disgust eyeing the mangled mess of limb barely attached the bound and unconscious red-headed archer.

The guards who brought Harper in had been standing uncomfortably by the door, afraid of the crime lord for excellent reasons.

He had ordered them to bring Roy to him, _unharmed_. That had been a pleasure he'd been reserving for himself.

" The car rolled, sir, many times." The only brave man said. " He got his arm caught between the twisted up door and the road. The metal was enough to cut-"

" _Thank you_ ," Sionis cut him off, " I can see what it did." 

He returned his crimson eyes to Roy, relentlessly staring him down with a burning gaze. Harper was less muscular than in his picture, but being inactive for quite some time meant his body wasn't under constant strain and he lost some muscle along the way. His hair was also longer, which Sionis found pretty emasculating.

Though unconscious, his face bore a frown of pain especially dark against his pale freckled cheeks. 

The room was filled with the constant drip-dropping of blood from the severed limb.

" We can't have him bleeding out just yet. Go get Doctor Hughes, one of you assholes." He gestured to the guards with a wave and three men scampered off to do the job of one. 

Once alone, Sionis came up close to Roy and examined his features. He was bitterly disappointed.

He had been sure that a replacement would come easy, but seeing Harper made him realise he wanted Jason.

Only Jason.

He didn't want these other assets despite how readily they were available. He needed to get his little runaway back.

He snatched Roy's jaw in one hand and turned his face from one side to the other, eyes lingering on his mouth while he wondered how many times Jason's soft lips had brushed over it.

How often had his hands been all over Sionis's boy? 

The thought repulsed him.

An unquenchable hunger stirred within him and he found himself anticipating the moment Jason would come running back to save his precious Roy, and then he would have him.

He would have him and not let him go. 

Grinning to himself, Sionis released Roy's face and left him alone in the room where Pyg used to carry out his conditioning sessions.

The door closed behind him by itself and the lock fell into place, a sound so familiar from all the times he'd paid Jason a visit here. 

On his way to his office Doctor Hughes and a few guardsmen passed, going down the hall to the room he'd just come from. They would fix Harper up good as new, all ready for the moment where Jason would inevitably trade himself for his love. 

Sentimentality and _love_ were things Sionis had always found to be a waste of time, but with the way he missed possessing Jason, the crush of his own body on Jason's slightly smaller one, he realised there was a fine line between love and obsession.

Or then he just didn't like to lose anything he'd made his own.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please leave a comment and let me know what you think, oh beautiful person wasting their day reading this fanfic.


	8. Chapter 8

Jason twisted his fingers back into impossible contortions and stared at his feet, unable to bring himself to meet Br - Batman's gaze, that drifted to him every so often despite Dick explaining the situation.

He couldn't look at him, couldn't talk to him, it wasn't right.

The burrowing, relentless eyes and dark cowl, age, posture, even the width of his shoulders all reminded him far too much of the person who had taught him what was and was not acceptable. 

And interlocking sights with his superior was certainly not that.

Daring to make visual contact would result in a week without water and salt poured into his eyes.

He would never forget how it burned beneath his lids.

" If Sionis has Roy," Bruce said, dragging his attention from Jason to Dick.

" It's because he wants Jason back, and that's not going to happen. Do we know which building they're in yet?"

Already, his fingers were racing across the keyboard before him like an army of speedsters, checking every security camera that had a view of Sionis's properties.

" Jason thinks it's his main HQ. Black Mask is expecting Jason to come back, to the most logical place would be the obvious one. He knows we can't get to him when he's hiding in there." Dick explained all this with a sour taste in his mouth. The idea that Sionis anticipated his little brother returning to his feet like a lost puppy just because he had a treat was revolting. 

And the worst part?

Jason would if they weren't here to stop him. Mask's conditioning had vanquished every bit of dignity and willpower he had once been known for. 

Bruce didn't comment on or ask why Jason wasn't telling any of this to him himself, he was distraught and shaking just by being around him. He could hear little ragged intakes of air coming from the corner Jason had backed into.

For now, they would have to use Dick as a conduit for communication because his younger son's voice did not serve him after whatever sick many things had been done to him.

At least Jason spoke to Dick. That was something shy of good.

Bruce zoomed in on a man he spotted entering the building through the back and panned the screen on the 4x4 truck his trained eye spied behind him. The front light was smashed, paint scratched, and the bullbars damaged ever so slightly, all indications that it recently rammed into something. _Hard_.

" You're right, Dick. Main HQ. Traffic cameras on highway 12 caught this same vehicle smashing into another one, registered to Roy. The building itself is impenetrable, guards and cameras on every floor, but it has blind spots. The 44th storey cuts power to its security system every fifteen minutes for thirty seconds exactly. We can glide to it from a nearby building--"

" It - It'll take too long." Jason half whispered. He'd come closer a few steps without them hearing, but still wouldn't raise his head and look at them, though he was obviously addressing Dick and not Bruce.

His breath hitched audibly in his throat when Bruce turned in his chair to face him but reversed his actions after seeing the response they triggered. 

His father and brother exchanged a worried glance.

" Roy n - needs help n - now." He continued to hopelessly stumble with his words and Dick carefully laid his hand on his shoulder, giving him a reassuring smile after which he continued with just a fraction more ease.

" S - Sir wants m - me. I - if I go back, he - will let Roy go."

" _Absolutely_ _not_." Bruce's voice boomed louder across the cave than he'd meant, filling every nook and cranny in it. The sudden explosion of noise had Jason flinching violently, trying to back away when Dick's arms found their way around him, a barrier not meant to restrain but to simply hold. 

" You're okay, Little Wing, you're okay." Dick lulled him and brushed back his hair despite the trembling that made Bruce well up with guilt. He hadn't ever imagined he could scare Jason so badly with two words. 

Once he had pacified Jason enough to direct his attention momentarily away, Dick turned back to their father. Bruce had been wise enough not to try intervene, it would only make everything go to pieces even more. 

" I hate to say it, B, but he's not wrong."

" Dick, _don't_." He spoke softer this time but the warning went through, or at least it would have, if there had been a better alternative plan.

" Hear me out, Bruce. If Sionis suspects a thing he'll kill Roy and go after Lian next." He felt Jason tense against him at the mention of the girl's name.

" We give him Jason back, but he'll have a tracker on him. Jason can get him in a moment of vulnerability, where he's out of his safe zone, and we can snag the bastard." 

" It's too risky." Bruce shook his head, no matter the consequences he refused to allow that monster's hands on his son or anywhere near him.

His plan had less fluid but it kept Jason out of harm's way.

" They're both risky, Bruce, but we're talking about Jason's family, here. It's his call." He withdrew the arm around his brother a fraction and looked down at him. "

Whaddya wanna do, Jay?"

Jason trembled far more inwardly under those stares. Sir didn't want him to, he wasn't sure what Dick wanted, but he _knew_ what Roy needed. Roy needed him to be strong, unafraid. 

This was his mess anyway, it was only right if he paid for it and no one else.

He took a shuddery breath and nodded.

" O - okay. I - I can do it."

Bruce grimly began calculating the rest of their plan, which no part of him wanted to go through with. If he did not help, however, Jason would do this on his own anyway and be in far more danger because of it.

Stealing a glance at Jason, it was obvious there was no part of him that wasn't terrified. Right now, the sight of his was comparable to a wounded animal fearfully returning to its master for punishment.

Bruce hated this plan.

* * *

 

_The pain._

To begin with, the pain was almost more than Roy's brain was capable of comprehending, and he had been in a lot of bad scrapes in the past.

He'd been vaguely aware of a white blur of a man dressed in a lab coat tinkering around him, poking at him with a variety of sharp objects and running a needle and thread through the many ragged partings in his flesh.

All that aside, he found it odd the couldn't feel a thing in his right arm and he supposed that was good, meant that it may be the only part of him that wasn't totalled. 

A belt or rope had been tied above his elbow to cut off all circulation for some God-only-knows-why reason, but he hadn't had the energy to argue about that. What he did, however, have the energy for, was ripping apart the gimp-masked man he could see from the corner of his field of vision, who stood obnoxiously close.

That is, he would have if he weren't restrained, strapped down to some surface in a bright white room with a one-way mirror staring him down. 

Roy couldn't even move his head with the strap across his throat and forehead, and he knew damn well he was in a shit load of trouble.

Lab coat, Doctor Hughes someone called him, was doing something to his arm. Roy bet he was under a tonne of sedatives or other potent drug because he was completely numb to whatever was being done to him.

He didn't know if that was a mercy or not.

He didn't want mercy from these people.

" You gonna stand there all day, Blackie?" Roy spat, emerald eyes exuding all his hatred in waves. Again he jerked against the straps even though it was in vain, he just wanted so badly to wipe the bemused expression off Sionis's face, which he swore he was wearing beneath the mask. 

" 'Cause from what I hear, you like it when people can't defend themselves." 

Sionis was unamused. He'd honestly hoped for what the archer lacked in  appeal to him, he would make up for in brain cells.

Some things were too much to ask for.

" Who told you that, Harper? Jason?" There was a distinct amount of mockery in his voice, as if to amp up what they both knew he had done. 

Roy's glare deepened and his lip curled back to reveal his teeth, like a lion desperate to pounce.

" _Don't_ say his name." 

It sounded contaminated when it rolled off that man's tongue. 

Sionis didn't miss out on the way that sounded like a threat, as if Roy could actually do anything in his current helpless state. 

" What would you prefer I call him?" He leaned forward a fraction, hands behind his back as his signature stance.

" My bitch? My cock sleeve? A _whore_? A _slut_? What we've got in common?" 

A raging primal anger within Roy's chest grew and crackled wild as an open fire with every insult Sionis dished out. He needed Mask's blood across his knuckles like he needed to breathe. He tried yanking any one of his limbs free again just to have something with which to lash out with.

Doctor Hughes looked up from the work Roy's couldn't see him doing and glanced over at Sionis, whatever the hell he was trying to accomplish being disrupted. 

" Sir, please, I can't work if he's aggravated." The whine to his tone was met by an 'I don't give a fuck' glower from his boss and he returned wordlessly to his instruments. His survival instincts were on point.

" You probably don't know this, Harper," Sionis continued to taunt Roy, getting some form of sick satisfaction from it. " But Jason _likes_ a strong man. Someone who can put him in his place."

His muscles were beginning to quake with inhumane torrents of justifiable rage. Roy had never hated anyone to the extent he hated Roman Sionis at that moment.

" Shut the fuck up. You don't know a thing about Jason."

" And you do?" He smirked. " Do you know how he got that scar on his jaw? The long pale one? How about where the bruises on his thighs keep coming from? And I'm sure you have in fact noticed that every time you touch him, he flinches. Do you know where all that came from? I do."

He leaned in way too close to deliver the last and whispered into Roy's ear,

" _I_ put those there."

The hiss of the devil perched on his shoulder was all Roy heard and the mental image of this monster hurting Jason was the final push he needed to drag his arm through the restrains and swing it into Sionis's face with a rewarding smack. 

But as he did, as Mask stumbled a few feet back, his right arm also slid out of the straps way too easily and as he glanced at it, his heart beat once then stopped.

His whole arm, from his elbow down, was... was gone. Just white gauze with blood staining the stump remained.

Lingering on it didn't happen, however, when Mask's ringed backhand came across his face and snapped his head to the left with it so hard that it hurt his neck.

Hughes shoved him back down and reconnected the straps, hands fumbling as he feared for what his boss would do after such an act of insolence.

And Roy... Roy was in a dazed trance of sorts, struggling to actually comprehend the missing limb when it should not have been so hard.

" Hughes," Sionis growled, licking away the blood that stuck his mask to his face. Harper had split his lip even through his leather facial covering. " I don't think those damn sedatives are necessary."

His wicked ruby eyes met with the archer's and the hatred there was in equal measure to what Roy felt towards him. An endless, vast desire to rip the other's throat out.

" Make sure he feels _everything_."

* * *

 

 _" Remember, Little Wing,"_ Dick's voice crackled distorted through the earpiece, so close it made Jason jump a little in fright before he remembered it was there. He shivered and closed around himself tighter as he stepped in through the doors that lead to the lobby outside of Sionis's office. 

_" We're right outside."_

Jason nodded despite there being no chance Dick could see it. " O - okay." 

He was limping every step of the way to the dreaded double doors where a guard, surprised by his return, walked him in the rest of the way. Sionis wasn't in his office and the man left him to wait while he went to find their boss. With a slam, Jason was alone again, standing in the centre of the room where all this shit started so many months ago.

Through the too-quiet atmosphere, his eyes drifted to and then lingered on the patch of carpeting that still wore the remnants of his blood.

Why had Sionis never had that cleaned?

Knowing him, it was to preserve the memory of one of his greatest accomplishments. 

Every time he stood here he remembered the burn of the knife sailing through his gut in one way or another. Sometimes as just a ghost and sometimes it was very vivid.

Today it was vivid.

The marred knots of scars twisted and turned, grinding the retentions of blood and pain into his head. He didn't even notice he wasn't breathing until he started to feel woozy and had to take a breath. 

Hands shaking, the pressed down on the comm in his ear.

" D - Dick, you still there?" 

_" Yeah, Jay, still here."_

Jason tried to draw something, anything from the knowledge that his big brother was right outside, even when the Batman was with him.

Dick was going to help him if things went south again, he'd promised.

He was outside on the opposite roof, he could see him from the window, and he would end Sionis if he tried anything. Sionis would give him Roy back, and then Jason only had to lure him somewhere Nightwing and... and Batman could get the jump on him.

It was simple and it would be okay.

It would be okay.

" _Jason_." His name was spoken with a deliberate dose of contempt and through a sneer as Black Mask entered. He was alone, no bodyguards or form of protection against Red Hood, because he was just that certain that he gripped the reigns tight.

And he wasn't wrong.

Jason didn't know how he was supposed to respond. Seeing Sionis, he felt all matter of things. Hate, fear, and the desperate need to fulfil every order given to him by the masked man. 

He didn't want to feel the last two. 

Sionis walked until they were a foot from one another and Jason took a hesitant step back, unsure what sort of response he would get.

Surprisingly, Sionks didn't hit him. Maybe he somehow knew Nightwing and Batman were outside and would repay blood with blood.

" I knew you would be back," Sionis smirked behind his mask, reaching out and tenderly picking a lock of Jason's ebony hair betwixt his fingers. He rubbed the silky strands between them.

Jason tried to lift his head and meet his eyes, but couldn't.

He'd thought he could be strong enough at least to defy that one small order, but every lesson and warning came closing around his throat all at once.

He prayed Dick couldn't see him looking so scared.

" Is it because I have something of yours?" Sionis cooed, hand sliding over from his hair to trace his jawline. Jason's tongue felt paralyzed as it sat useless in the cavern of his mouth, unable to say one word as those awful, wicked fingers trailed down his throat and tugged on the zipper of his hoodie. 

Jason's arms wouldn't respond to his commands of shoving the man away from him.

" Speak up, baby. You want your Roy, don't you?" 

Jason managed a small jerking nod, his breathing bearing an audible tremor. 

" Y - you can have me... sir, j - just let him g - go." It took everything he had to say only that one sentence.

Sionis tipped his head to one side, considering him while he savoured the way the boy still trembled around him.

He was and always would be, _scared_.

It was obvious the kid thought he had some sort of an upper hand here, a card up his sleeve.

 _Poor thing,_ Sionis thought, _how must it feel to be so misled?_

" Oh, Jason," he finally said, breaking the tense silence like a cannonball against glass.

" I always _had_ you. But I also have no need for your beloved anymore, why don't I just keep you and kill him?"

Jason's eyes shifted and his lips trembled for a second before he could speak. " Sir, pl  - please don't. I'll do a - anything." 

" _Anything_?" He quirked a brow, a smirk weighing on his voice. " Baby, I can get you to do anything with or without leverage. You know I can."

Jason swallowed under the intense stare and truth behind those words.

" I have men ordered to kill Harper the second they catch a glimpse of black or blue, so you can just go ahead and call off your daddy and your pretty brother outside."

Sionis's grin broadened when Jason's face lit up with surprise, trying to connect how it was that he knew their foolish plan. 

He stroked Jason's soft cheek.

" Darling, I'm not sure this ever even occurred to you, but maybe I've got you bugged?" He pressed down on a barely noticeable bump burrowed into his cheekbone, just enough to make it hurt. Jason winced as it dawned on him. 

Sionis had listened in on every conversation.

" Now call those bitches outside, and tell them....."

 

* * *

 

Batman was getting irritated by Nightwing constantly shifting his position beside him, but he kept quiet about it because they were both equally concerned about Jason. It was all Dick could do to keep from running to rescue his brother from Sionis caressing his hair and touching his face. 

Batman knew how he felt because he himself felt the same way.

Watching on edge through binoculars, he realised then made a note of how Jason was as squirrelly around Black Mask as he had been around him. It was the same fear and same reactions. 

A terrible thought loomed above the Dark Knight like a storm cloud, his son didn't think they were the same person, did he?

" B," Nightwing said and extended his arm, pointing at something. " Look."

Sionis left Jason alone quite peculiarly, and he quickly clicked the comm back on. He wasn't stammering anymore, his voice was rehearsed as Batman remembered it was when he was under orders.

And intended warning sign or an oversight? 

_" Nightwing, change of plans. I need you and B to find Roy while I occupy Mask. Can you go that?"_

" Jay, what's going on?" Dick was worried and exchanged glances with his father, who frowned behind his cowl, the whites over his eyes becoming slits.

 _" Just find Roy. I've got the rest covered."_ With no more context, he pulled the earpiece out and dropped it on the ground, following suit after Sionis.  

" This is a trick. Sionis is planning something." Stressing, Nightwing pointed out the obvious, already readying a grappling hook to swing over onto the other building with.

" We find Roy, go after Mask second." The Dark Knight grappled over the stomach-clenching drop and landed with perfect balance onto a ledge, Nightwing following only a second later. 

" And Jason?" He asked anxiously, following his father and mentor in through the 44th storey window during the lapse in security. It was too perfect of an opportunity, they both knew.

And Batman didn't reply.

* * *

 

Jason followed Sionis onto the helipad, heart pounding so hard his ribs ached. All he could think of was Roy, dead if he didn't follow along and hopefully manage to do something to bring Sionis down.

It was possible for him, physically, at least, but that was his Sir, raising a fist at him was not to be done. 

Internally, he kept screaming at himself to break out of the conditioning but nothing would shift. There was no click of things falling into place.

Dick would make sure Roy was safe, he didn't need to worry about that. As long as he just did what Sionis wanted, everyone would be okay. If not, if he disobeyed, the guards would shoot Roy and Dick dead upon the first sign of trouble on his part.

An armed guardsman opened the sliding side door of the helicopter, its rotor blades whirring and spinning faster and faster with each time it went around. The downdraft was enough to ruffle their clothes like flags in the wind. 

" Jason," Black Mask jerked his head towards the entrance for him to go. That was an order.

 _Don't go, don't go, don't go_ , a voice that sounded like himself, Roy, Dick, and everyone who cared about him all at once repeated in his head. 

He had to obey, stay put, and run all at once. 

Jason stood frozen, conflicting thoughts tearing up his mind as the wind whipped his hair and the helicopter's deafening reverberation roared in his ears.

He struggled against the all-consuming must to do as he was told and at the same time, get back to his family. 

He couldn't do both.

" _Jason_." Mask repeated, more sternly this time. His glare fixed on the boy and made an untold quantity of silent threats, each a premonition of the fates he would suffer if compliance wasn't immediate. 

Jason didn't budge.

Sighing in frustration, Sionis rolled his eyes and gestured for his guards to seize Jason.

They lurched forward and wrapped their big rough hands around his arms, fingers burrowing into his biceps as they began dragging him towards the helicopter. Jason dug his heels in and thrashed against them, the intense struggling spearing his leg like a thousand small flames became alight in his veins. 

His limp worsened to the point where it made him stagger. 

He yanked loose one arm and ploughed his fist into the first face he could reach, elbowing the second man in the gut twice, until he released him. He was about to dart across the roof when - 

" Jason," Sionis's voice cut through the commotion, " _drowse_." 

That singular word, one syllable, and Jason's lights went out. He collapsed onto the ground with a  solid hard smack, eyes shut and head rolling to the side.

Not sure what they saw, the guards collected him with far less difficulty and between them, carried him into the copter as per their boss's orders.

Sionis watched them and followed soon after.

The ground beneath them shifted as the chopper began to rise into the air and the door shut. 

" Restrain him." He instructed, taking a seat and strapping himself in. Zip ties were looped around Jason's wrists and pulled tightly behind his back. 

Sionis eyed them in consideration.

" Put one around his throat too." With little enough oxygen, the kid wouldn't try anything stupid.

The men regarded him sceptically but didn't raise a question, connecting the two ends of another zip tie about the Hood's neck and closing it until the only intakes of air he could drag into his lungs were the ones that he absolutely needed to live, but not even those came easily.

They were in the clear, Sionis had gone so far as to assume when in the corner of the window, a rapid flash of dark blue caught his attention.

 

* * *

 

Nightwing ditched Batman and the plan, racing up flights of stairs to the roof where the helicopter blades whirred without caring for the burning in his lungs or aching in his muscles.

He _had_ to find Jason.

That was all he focused on. 

He'd promised Jason everything would be okay.

He kicked down every door in his path and ran across the roof as fast as his legs could carry him, but by then the copter was already meters off the ground and hovering towards the edge quickly.

He forced himself to move faster, each breath ripping his windpipe to pieces like he was being made to swallow mouthfuls of broken glass. 

" Jason!" He exclaimed despite the futility of it.

 _Nonononono_ he kept on yelling over and over to himself until he leapt clean off the roof and latched onto the landing gear whilst it began to retract into to body of the aircraft.

He fumbled with his lessening hold, dangling a sickening seventy storeys above the street below. He removed one hand and yanked two batarangs off his belt. Holding his breath as the wind blasted his face, Nightwing plunged one into the metallic undercarriage, held it firm in his gloved fist, and did the same with the other the exact second his previous carry was shut away. 

His arms trembled under the strain of moving beneath the chopper with stabs of the faultlessly sharp steel bats that were beginning to slice through his Kevlar padded gloves and into his hands, gliding through the first layers of skin with ease, the way they were designed to.

He was almost at the door when it was flung open and one man with a death wish swung himself out enough to unleash a myriad of rattling gunfire upon the vigilante. A bullet nicked by Nightwing's arm and another thudded straight into his chest, caught only by his body armour. Still, it wasn't painless and hit like being on the receiving end of a sledgehammer, squeezing his ribcage on his lungs and expelling the air. 

In that split second jolt with the force of an invisible freight train, his hands slipped. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi. Yeah. I did it again. 
> 
> Sionis has Jay, *shocker*.
> 
> C'mon, you musta known I was gonna do this.
> 
> Don't you know by now that I am the devil incarnate?


	9. Chapter 9

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Warning, this only gets darker from here on out. Will contain torture, physical and psychological.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you to Nance and Hellyon, who gave me great ideas as to what Sionis has in store for our two lovebirds. 
> 
> Warning, you're in for some dark, disturbing shit.

The wind stole Nightwing's breath and tore at him with its hooked claws as he hurtled towards the ground from the 70th floor. Tears streamed from his eyes like waterfalls in reverse and he flailed his limbs while the sound of the helicopter gliding away above him grew rapidly further.

All he could think was Jason. Sionis had his little brother.

Nightwing had stupidly left his grappling hook hanging on the ledge on the other side of the building and within minutes he would be a red stain on the road below. 

_Be resourceful, Dick._

He pulled his knees to his chest, so that he could reach his ankles and rapidly fumbled with the straps around them. Once he got them open, he thrust his balled up fists through the loops and yanked his arms up, flexing his entire body straight and dragging the ripstop nylon wings out his sides. 

He really, really hoped the experimental wingsuit Tim had wanted him to test lived up to expectation.

Air was pocketed beneath the artificial wings, slowing his descent to the point where he could control the direction he was falling in. Nightwing, now true to his name, dipped his arm to the left, swooping around the building until he could angle himself right to crash through a window without impaling himself on the reinforced shards of glass. Angling aside, he couldn't maintain his footing and tumbled back in with a loud showering of broken window, rolling several times across the floor.

Blood seeped from a countless number of abrasions through the parts in his suit not padded with Kevlar and he struggled to push himself up with his bleeding hands, both with deep wounds clean across his palms. His efforts to rise left smeared red handprints on the smooth marble floor.

_Jason._

Nightwing found his feet and started running while refolding the wings back into his suit, neither task performed as well as it should whilst done at the same time. 

He clicked on the comm wiggled into his ear.

" B, where are you?" His voice was urgent and tremulous as he raced up staircases, taking five steps in one bound.

 _" 54th floor."_ The background was filled with grunts and the unmistakable sounds of flesh hitting flesh. Nightwing kicked more speed into himself and was soon bursting into an all too familiar scene, men either unconscious on the ground or groaning weakly as Gotham's defender swept over them until he found one still well enough to speak.

Batman wrapped a handful of the man's shirt around his fist and yanked him off the ground, slamming him into the wall and pinning him there.

" _Where's Harper_?" He demanded, gruff and forceful. His glare beneath his cowl was enough to send demons screaming back to hell.

The man kept a stiff upper lip, refusing to relinquish anything, despite the fear that Nightwing saw in his eyes saying that he might liked to have.

" Where's Harper?!" Batman withdrew his arm and thrust it back into the wall, cracks forming in it as the soldier's body hit. He gasped in pain but remained stubborn.

Nightwing could remember several times he would have stepped in at this point, used some other tactic, something other than violence, but today...

Today was different.

He yanked the guard from his mentor and marched to the nearest window, dragging the struggling being behind him as he did. Nightwing shattered the glass with one hard kick and without even a heart beat's hesitation, extended his arm out. The man screamed and stupidly thrashed as he dangled hundreds of meters off the ground, hands enclosing tightly around the vigilante's wrist as he pleaded incoherently. 

" Harper," Nightwing growled, the points of his teeth flashing as he glared. " Where is he?"

" Si - Sionis ordered us to move him!" 

" _Where_?" He released his grip and allowed the man to fall for only a few inches before his hand shot out and caught him again, in mid-scream.  

Batman watched grimly from aside, disturbed by this version of son that he so fleetingly ever saw. He would have held Nightwing back if the information they needed wasn't so vital and if he wasn't getting it so progressively.  The terror-stricken guard screamed out everything he knew, which was in fact, hardly helpful in the least. He couldn't even give them a location. Roman Sionis wasn't one to allow info out of the need-to-know. 

Nightwing yanked the man back into the building angrily and left him on the floor as he stepped over fallen bodies, fists clenched tightly. Batman fell into step beside him, lips drawn into a straight line and brow furrowed.

" Sionis has Jason." Dick grumbled murderously, so unlike his usual peppy nature. His father noted that he was injured, his hands trembling and cut open.

Batman ran a quick search on the computer built into his gauntlet and soon his mood darkened to match his cape.

" Jason's tracker has been disabled." He grunted, knowing what that meant. Black Mask had Jason. Black Mask had Roy. They had done exactly as he wanted and because somehow, he had been one step ahead of them.

Nightwing thought back on Batman warning them against this in the cave and sighed angrily.

" Now's the right time to say I told you so."

No part of the Dark Knight wanted to say that.

* * *

 

_" ....Time is going by, so much faster than I, and I'm starting to regret not spending all of it with you...."_

 

_Jason squeezed his eyes shut tighter against the purr of the car engine, the small jolts of the vehicle, and the soft melody from the radio wrapping around his head. He tried to push aside all the noises and distractions and carry on sleeping, nuzzling closer to the window and squashing his cheek against it. He curled tighter around himself, in a state far too groggy to notice Roy was smiling at him._

 

_" ....So if I haven't yet, I've gotta let you know....."_

 

_Roy turned the volume dial up several notches, reaching over with one hand on the wheel and shaking Jason by the shoulder. He grumbled something insensible and pushed the hand away._

_" Wakey, wakey, sleeping beauty. We're almost home."_

_True to his word, the unflatteringly ugly shapes of tower blocks and monuments stood dark against the skyline ahead. Even after the wonderful weekend they'd spent camping in the forest, and Roy still didn't know how he had convinced Jason to come, setting eyes upon Gotham was a welcome sight. Hellhole though it was, it was home._

_" Mmh." Jason sat up, back arched into a defeated slouch. He palmed at his eyes and blinked back drowsiness with heavy lids then looked at Roy, nothing but confusion laid thick on his features. Roy bit back a smile. There was something extremely cute about a sleepy, enervated Jason. Maybe it was the dishevelled hair and whole minutes of perplexion until he remembered where he was._

_" There we go." Roy grinned, turning his attention back to the road after checking on a passed out Lian, stretched out across the backseats with two seatbelts she'd insisted she needed holding her there._

_" What is this?" Jason asked as he frowned at the radio, listening intently to the lyrics of the song that was paying as he began rousing himself._

 

_"...You're never gonna be alone! From this moment on, if you ever feel like letting go..."_

 

_" Hm, I think this is Nickelback."_

_Jason cringed and made a face. " Yeesh, fuck, how could you let this crap invade my sleeping brain?"_

_" Language. Lian is in the back." Stern warning aside, Roy was smiling. " I kinda like this song, but want me to change channels?"_

 

_"... I won't let you fall..."_

 

_Jason leaned back, listening. The soft melody relaxed him in a way that the usual music he blasted into his head, Hollywood Undead and Metallica, could never do. He liked the slow, calming song, but he was not saying that aloud. He had a reputation to maintain, after all, and was not about to be caught red-handed, liking a crappy lovey-dovey song._

_" Whatever, ginger. Listen to your crap music."_

_That was not an entirely selfless statement, Roy knew, and turned the music down a little so that his daughter could sleep. He stole a sly glance at Jason, secretly enjoying the way he pretended not to like the song but it still had the gears turning in his eyes, eyes that always held Roy like strong hypnosis. Jason was taking small nips of his lower lip, squeezing the creased flesh between his teeth the way he often did when he was thinking._

_Lian gave a sleepy moan from the back, solacing her father simply with her presence._

_Inwardly, he sighed in content. Sometimes, things just seemed so perfect._

 

_"...... I'll hold you 'till the hurt is gone....."_

 

* * *

 

Jason awoke from the dream, or maybe the memory, to fingers brushing against his cheek. He recognised the touch, though colder than usual, it was unmistakable. 

 _Roy_.

For a few moments, there was confusion.

_Why was Roy here?_

_Hadn't Sionis captured them both?_

He pushed his heavy eyelids open, feeling something tight around his neck and restricting his breathing. His arms weren't moving the way he wanted them to, restrained also. Jason tried to focus his blurry gaze on where  Roy was, or where _he_ was, but the second his vision adjusted was like a scene from a hack-and-slash horror movie. 

There, right before him, was Roman Sionis, sitting on the edge of the bed Jason had been laid on as he caressed his face with the cold, dead fingers of a mangled arm. The greying and torn flesh had streaks of colour in the form of angular green tattoos. Tattoos that he would know anywhere. 

Jason screamed in pure horror and kicked at him, backing away despite there being nowhere to go.  His back hit the headboard with a loud thud that he swore, shook the entire room. His heart slammed into his ribcage, trying to burst through the frail caging of bones and he couldn't tear his gaze from the mutilated arm no matter how much he wanted to rip his eyes out so as to never see it again. But that wouldn't help, not when it was burned into his brain. Bile was building up in the back of his throat and all he could do to keep from throwing up was to bite his lip bloody and bruised.

Fingers that had once caressed his hair and cupped his cheek every time he needed comfort were now as rigid, hooked tree branches.

Sionis wasn't wearing his mask, giving the boy a clear view of the smug smirk stretched across his skeletal features as he played with Roy's arm like he was handling a toy, and not a severed human limb. He rolled it from hand to hand.

" And I thought I couldn't make you scream anymore." He said with a small, mock chuckle through an overbearingly content smile. Jason's lips trembled for words he couldn't voice and his stricken eyes rose to meet evil red ones. His chest was constricting painfully and with or without the zip tie around his throat, he knew he wouldn't be breathing right now. 

Sionis found deliberate pleasure in keeping him waiting for the answer he knew the kid was dying for. He took his sweet time before delivering.

" Your precious ginger isn't dead, son. I realised we could have a lot more fun with him, if he's still breathing. And believe me, I've got a few fun things planned."

" Y - you said you wou - would let him go." Jason feebly protested, as if it actually mattered. They both knew it didn't. 

" I lied, baby, I lied." He actually had the nerve to fake sounding apologetic, like he was confessing a sin to a Catholic priest in the wait for penance. Jason fumbled with his tied wrists behind his back and swallowed hard against the painfully tight zip tie bruising his throat, more than a little afraid of what that wicked smile meant for not so much himself, but for Roy. 

He wanted to scream his voice raw just for knowing the archer had been dragged into this sick game of puppeteers. This mess was supposed to be between him and Roman.

" Now, I have a few things we could start off with."

Sionis placed the arm on the nightstand, smiling at the strangled gagging noise from Jason, and pulled the boy off the bed and onto his feet. Jason tried to stand but the pain in his leg was simply too much and the best he could do was walk with an almost emphasised looking limp as Sionis half dragged him out of the room.

Jason knew where they were by now, he'd been brought here once or twice in the past when Black Mask had wanted solitude with him. This was Sionis's isolated lake house, surrounded by miles of thick pine forest and nestled on the shores of a lake more comparable to a small ocean.

Although it looked like nothing out of the ordinary on the outside, Jason knew the walls were reinforced and soundproof, same with the doors, and the windows were blast-proof glass with no way to open them. Surveillance cameras and hidden guards were surely peppered around the forest in case he even managed to get out of the house, where a single shot from a sniper's rifle would end him. 

And the worst part? They were over two hundred miles outside of Gotham, which meant they were out of the Bat's radar. _That_ didn't bother Jason as much as being out of Nightwing's area of authority.

He shivered as remembered his brother promising him that everything would be fine.

He had lied. 

Jason's mind darkened and shifted blame angrily.

Dick had fucking lied, straight to his face.

He was beginning to understand what Sionis meant when he said his entire family were nothing but a gathering of manipulative bastards. 

Black Mask pulled Jason by his bound arm, through the few hallways until they were in the lavish living room, complete with a bear skin rug and a fire in the heart. If there was one thing that could be said about Roman Sionis despite his cruel, sadistic nature, it was that he liked things proper. 

Jason had once wondered how homosexuality fits into being 'proper' by his standards. 

Jason quickly realised why he had been brought here in particular. There was an ornate totem pole in the corner of the room, reaching the floor and the roof, which made it perfect for restraining people to. In this case, Sionis had had Roy tied to it with several nylon ropes across his chest and pinning his one remaining arm to his side. The injury had been treated, surprisingly enough, but several smaller ones remained as gaping holes in his flesh.

He looked up when they came in, eyes cloudy with the considerable pain but still spitting angry embers at Sionis. Roy was as strong as he was stubborn.

But then he saw Jason, who he'd last spoken to almost eight months ago, and the anguish and agony worsened.

He was several pounds thinner than Roy remembered, entire shades paler, at least from what he could tell from the few patches of Jason's skin not covered in purple-black blotches. He wasn't walking right, a goddamn zip tie was making his throat constrict, and most notably, he was scared, guilty, ashamed, and so many other things Roy knew he shouldn't be feeling right now. They were in for hell with Black Mask, that was true, but that wasn't what Jason looked afraid of. 

" _Jason_..." Was all Roy could force from the confines of his throat, as he hadn't been prepared for such a reunion. He'd intended on saving Jason from his man, not being captured himself and used as a tool against him. 

Jason swallowed hard again and didn't even meet his gaze, saying nothing, not even protesting when Sionis had both hands on his shoulders and was pushing him onto his knees.

The man, who Roy was now firmly believing was the devil, gave him a smirk and a smug wink that made Roy's stomach turn with both disgust and rage. 

" You were curious where those cuts and bruises kept coming from, remember, Harper? Well," he sat on the couch and with a single jerk of his finger, gestured for Jason to approach. There was no hesitation or reluctance, just compliance, and Roy found that immensely disturbing, sickening even. 

" Let me show you." He finished as Jason positioned himself between Mask's knees and without being told to, started working the buckle of his belt. It was a rehearsed, practised cycle of movement where he pulled the thing through the loops and rolled  the painfully white pants down to where he could lower his mouth onto his hardening dick. Instantly he started suckling like a starved calf.

Roy noticed, through his intense repulsion and the dire need to gut Mask, that Jason licked his lips uncomfortably before he started giving head to a crime lord. 

Roy was lost for words no matter how many things he wanted to scream, watching in pure helplessness as Sionis grabbed a handful of Jason's hair and started bouncing his head up and down, as if the wincing and choking added to his pleasure.

The archer didn't want to watch this, but for some goddamn reason, his gaze was glued to what was unfolding.

Jason couldn't breathe with the zip tie and now the extra mass filling his throat and black dots were beginning to dance before his eyes as his cheeks tinged blue, but he wouldn't, he just couldn't pull back to allow himself a breath.  Although he was used to this extent of rough handling, it still made tears prick the corners of his eyes and knowing that Roy was watching made it all the worse.

Jason wanted the ground to swallow him up and suffocate him. He even found himself missing the dark enclosed space of his coffin.

He missed anywhere but here.

Up until now, Roy hadn't managed to get a word in despite his pitiful mewl of Jason's name, but when Jason started visibly suffocating and Mask didn't care, his anger kicked back in and defeated mortification. 

" Get your fucking hands off him!" Roy thrashed and pushed against the ropes with every ounce of his substantial hatred. Sionis grinned at his struggling and pressed Jason head down harder. At this point he wasn't doing any of this for pleasure, it was simply to taunt Roy. 

Maybe some part of him even wanted to make clear, which one of them owned the kid.

" If this hurts you, Harper," Sionis started, yanking Jason's up straight by his dark locks. He was giving small hoarse gasps.

" I have something that'll make your goddamn insides turn to jelly." Now smiling like he actually gave a damn about Jason, he softly stroked his cheek like he wasn't holding his head up by his hair, and Jason leaned ever so slightly into the touch.

Internally, everything inside Roy was screaming, what the fuck was happening here?!

He struggled harder against the binds.

" _Jason_ ," Mask said with slow deliberation, honey oozing from his voice in sickly sweet quantities. " Respond." 

One word, and it was like a switch was flipped. Jason rose and much to Roy's furthered horror, seated himself on Sionis's lap, where he cupped his abuser's head with his hands and proceeded to make out with him, allowing his tongue past his teeth and into his abraded mouth almost eagerly.

Sionis's hands searched his body, trailing down his sides and sinking white knuckled into his hips, fingers burrowing into the soft skin.

This was some kind of mind control, it had to be!  

" Jason, honey, I don't know what he's done to you," Roy all but whimpered, desperate to break Jason out of this trance that would break him.

It was the most revolting thing he had ever witnessed that Sionis had turned Jason's body, once a weapon, into a tool.

No. Less than a tool.

A _toy_. 

" But fight this, please. You can fight this!" 

Jason glanced over at him against his core demanding that he go through his Sir's order, but the voice he remembered once loving begged him not to. He'd almost forgotten Roy was here, almost blind to him with the haze of commands going back and forth, and with his memory refreshed, that same build up of shame and guilt tore his lips off Sionis's and sat back, eyes momentarily meeting Roy's, which pleaded with him for so many things he could not name. 

" Roy, I-"

Sionis's balled up fist crashed into the side of his head, sending electrical currents of pain darting through his skull. The blow must have been pretty hard because he hit the floor and the next thing he knew, the horribly familiar weight was crushing his body and big rough hands were closing around his throat to the point where the zip tie felt loose.

" You can blame Harper for this, baby." Sionis told him as he strangled the life out of him.

" Get the fuck off him!" Roy shrieked and kicked, struggled, pulled and ripped, anything he could do to escape the ropes that held him without care. Tears of helplessness were beginning to stream down his face in deltas while he watched, without being able to do a thing, as Black Mask pinned Jason down against his gasping and choking.

And Jason - Jason was _trying_ to fight him off for the first time in God knows how long. He needed to, to make sure Roy didn't see him as only as a weak, used a dolly.

" Jason..." Mask growled in a haze of red as the kid dared to struggle, and began reaching for something by the hearth. Roy saw what it was and terror leapt up.

" Jason, look-"

_Smack!_

Sionis swung the sharpened end of a cast iron fire poker into Jason's head with a splatter of blood and a wet thud, crimson streaking up the tool and his hand, even staining his immaculate white suit with drops.

Jason dropped like a rock, falling onto his side and eyelids fluttering weakly. A pool of blood was already forming around his head, the small raspy inhalations he was managing sucking some of his life fluid into his airways.

" Don't you fucking touch him." Roy warned through tears, breath trembling as Sionis set aside the poker and started to gather Jason up into his arms. Jason's entire body was slack and unresponsive.

" If you would have just kept your damn mouth shut, Harper, the kid wouldn't be hurt right now." Sionis explained, as if it made any sense. He shifted Jason, resting his bleeding head against his shoulder and not minding of the redness staining his jacket.

" What the fuck do you want with us?" Roy demanded, although his tone came out as more of a plead. Nothing sounded as loud as the drip dropping of Jason's blood falling on the floor, not even his own hammering heart in his ears.

" Jason is _mine_ , and unfortunately, the two of you are a package deal. We're going to have lots of fun, Harper, lots of tests and behavioural experiments." He tipped Jason's head back and pressed a rough kiss onto his torpid mouth, all to mock Roy for his current helpless state.

Roy swallowed down his stomach's contents, that kept rising up his throat. 

" And by the end of it, we'll see if Jason is worth all that pain and suffering to you."

" You're fucking insane." Roy managed with a hollow chuckle. " Your damn tests aren't going to change anything."

Sionis responded with a knowing smirk.

" We'll see." Then he turned, heading out of the room to whisk Jason away to locations unknown and do god knows what to him. Roy didn't want to even consider the vast array of possibilities.

" _Why_?" The archer said before he could completely disappear from sight lock down the dark passage. Sionis stalled when he heard him.

" Why are you doing all this?"

Black Mask considered the question for seconds that stretched on to an infinite number.

Finally, when he answered, it was the most unsettling thing he could have said.

" Because I feel like it."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And it only gets worse from here....


	10. Chapter 10

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Black Mask invents his sickest game to date.

Jason's skin was being pulled back and forth under the drag of Sionis's one hand on him, the other being wrapped around the zip tie and strangling him, as was his Sir's new favourite position. Every time the man on top of him withdrew only to come back harder, the wiry plastic cut into the soft flesh of Jason's throat where he already wore a collar of bruises.

He had given up with the raspy gasps and tried to focus only on getting enough air to his oxygen-starved brain to keep himself from passing out. He dreaded to think what Sionis would do to him if he was unconscious, or imagine what happened all the times he was.

Jason concentrated hard on staying awake, fighting back the swirling masses of blackness that wanted to claim him. Everything but that one simple task faded into the background, Sionis breathing heavily and pushing up against him, the cold chill of the autumn evening seeping into his naked body, and most forgivingly, the knowledge that like their first night here, Roy was present and tied to the totem pole. 

Jason knew he wasn't watching, knew he had his eyes screwed shut so tight he was halfway to forgetting the hellhole they were in, but even so, Jason wanted to crawl within himself from the sheer shame of it. He didn't know if his cheeks were dominated more by the blue of asphyxiation or the rush of red that came with the humiliation of being forcibly fucked with an audience consisting of one of the few people whose opinion used to mean a damn to him.

When a particularly hard thrust jarred his injured leg he couldn't stifle the strangled whimper, which was when a half amused chuckle from Sionis filled his ears.

" Don't go crying on me, son," he drew the back the zip tie and made Jason rasp further,

" don't want Harper knowing what a pathetic little bitch you are. At least not yet."

He delivered the last with a sadistic grin in his breathy voice as he drew almost all the way back and shoved himself into Jason time and time again.

Jason intestines were squashed and burning and twisted up. He was groaning to the near rhythmic _slap, slap, slap_ of their bodies colliding. Sionis' fingernails curved into his side and trailed down the ridges of his rib bones, leaving long white marks.

" _Ngh_ \- taking it so sweet, baby." Sionis purred. " Can't resist getting a cock in you, can you?"

Jason choked out something that sounded like a 'no sir' as he felt the dick in him twitch before spurting out strings of cum that filled him up. Sionis gave some sort of breathy grunt as Jason just took what was one of his most hated yet most routine sensations.

" Mmh. You're such a good little slut, aren't you, son? So quiet." He asked, considerably slowing his pace with the words. One more thrust  and after making sure it hurt, he pulled away. 

Finally allowed to breathe, Jason was gasping shudderingly, every inhalation making his muscles quake. He stared down at his trembling hands laid out flat against the cold stone floor tiles.

Roy didn't open his eyes when he heard Sionis getting up and reclosing his belt with soft clinks as the brass pieces connected. All he wanted was to wake up next to Jason in their apartment and realise this was all a fucking nightmare, but the bruises and cuts, the memory of the slams of Mask's body against Jason's were each a hideous reminder that this was real.  

" You two keep each other company now, I'll be back in a few hours with some more games to play." Sionis told them as casually as if he were merely going for a grocery run. He straightened his suit and tie, casting them a slow, deliberate glance through the slits in his mask. 

After only a few days here, he had subjected them to all forms of physical agony, but it was routine for Jason and therefore bore little effect. And Harper, stupid and stubborn Harper, refused to give him the satisfaction of even causing a few small cracks. The only times he ever seemed in actual torment was when Jason was added to the equation. 

Mask knew he needed to change tactics and soon.

When Sionis had gone Roy heard Jason rise and begin to re-clothe himself. Robotically he closed his belt around his waistline then gathered his crumpled up shirt from where it had been discarded on the floor and pulled it over his head, dishevelling his hair as he did. He smoothened the loose strands down with his hands, his behaviour not indicating a thing wrong.

He didn't meet Roy's eyes when he finally opened them or even look in his direction. 

" Babe, you okay?" Roy's voice was a hoarse whisper and he knew his words weren't the appropriate ones, because of course, he wasn't okay, but he didn't know what else to say.

Jason didn't reply and finished tidying himself up. Roy could tell that Jason had heard him but he nipped down on his lower lip and fixed his focus too intently on what he was doing to give an answer.

This was the first time Sionis had left them by themselves and it was clear there was an unseen angle to his decision, one Roy tried and failed to find. Idealistically, now would be the moment they could free themselves and look for a way out, but the archer had gotten his bearings enough to know leaving the locked and reinforced house would be their smallest obstacle. 

And looking at the tender way Jason manoeuvred himself around to complete given tasks, it was painfully obvious his right leg was badly injured and how that had happened, Roy didn't even want to imagine but it looked like severe nerve damage was the culprit. 

Though every movement reminded him with a dull ache of the limb he'd lost, he shifted beneath the ropes and tried talking to Jason again.

" Jay, please, talk to me." He whined with strainious tension pulling taut each word. 

When still he proceeded to ignore, Roy pushed harder.

" _Jason_. I know you don't want to talk, but we've got to get out of here." 

" We were ordered to stay." He monotonously replied, finally turning to face Roy, gaze drawn off the floor and interlocking with the archer's, and there was no familiarity there. Roy had never seen anyone's eyes so devoid of humanity and it made him sick to his stomach. 

" Fuck what that skull-faced bitch wants, Jason. We need to do something before he comes back."

" We were ordered to stay." Jason repeated, watching through his lashes at Roy's vain attempts to escape his binds and the stare promised that he would step in the way if his Sir's orders came under threat of being disobeyed. He didn't want to, but he had to.

The ropes scraped his skin as he yanked against them but Roy stopped abruptly, looking up at Jason with an expression somewhere between bewilderment and outrage when the words left his mouth.

" Think about Lian, Jason! She's all alone if something happens to us!" 

Jason stiffened at the mention of the girl's name, drawing his lips into a taut line. He tried not to think back on her happy dark eyes and sweet childish giggle, it would only complicate his thought process. 

His only concern was what Sionis wanted, and nothing more. 

..... _But Roy and Lian....._

" Look," Roy continued, derailing his dysfunctional mind with his raised voice and the continuation of his loud struggling. If he had both damn arms he would be loose by now.

" I know what sick shit that psycho did to you, but please, help me so we can get back to our daughter!" 

Jason's heart stopped with that last part and dared not beat again. The breath he was going to exhale got caught on some invisible grid rooted strongly in his throat, where it lingered as he processed those words.

 _Their_ daughter.

Roy had never called Lian that and Jason hadn't ever thought it was within his rights to assume such a title as her second parent. He wished he could have felt a burst of flowery happiness in his chest that he knew different circumstances would have allowed, but Sionis's rough hands on him were as constant as the pain coursing through his body, and they didn't allow for anything but submission to him and only him. 

" I - I'm sorry, Roy." He lowered his hollow teal-coloured eyes, wanting to obey Sionis and do as Roy pleaded both in equal measure. Not for the first time in his life, Jason felt like the rope in a game of tug-of-war, being torn and yanked at by two opposing forces.

Roy wouldn't hurt him if he didn't listen, however. Even if he would want to the ropes wouldn't let him.

When it came to it, the future pain ratio made his decision for him.

" I ca - _can't_." The words tumbled out like a tonne of bricks and Jason shivered beneath his gaze and the intense, unidentifiable emotions behind it.

Roy saw how scared Jason was to disobey Black Mask, petrified even, which made it certain then and there that he would not go against the man's orders, no matter what they were or how much he detested them.

Roy stopped moving all together and sighed, struggling not to drown in the overwhelming nature of the situation. His only comfort was knowing his baby girl was safe with Oliver in Star City, away from the sadistic mania that had swept both him and Jason into its torrents.

If he hadn't been before then he was now well-aware that unless by some miracle the Bat or Nightwing found them, it was up to him to find a way out of this mess. Jason wouldn't dare do anything that didn't come from Mask's zippered up mouth.

" It's okay, baby." Roy managed to say, realising how torturously conflicted Jason looked as he fumbled with his hands at a distance that seemed too far.  

" It's okay." He said again, leaning his head back against the hard exterior of the totem pole, that's rub on his bruised back had become all too familiar. Through his closed eyes and red lashes, a lonely tear saw it fit to squeeze through and roll down his cheek. 

He missed his daughter and the Jason who used to slap him for making a corny joke.

Before he knew it, under his breath he was humming that song that had played on the radio when they were coming home from the only camping trip they had ever taken. He needed to remember something good.

Jason listened to the tune, breathy as Roy murmured it to himself. He recognised it, used to pretend he hated it, and by no means did he want to dawdle on the memories that came attached to it. He watched the archer and noticed he was crying a little.

Jason used to cry, for the first few months of his conditioning, and he had hated being alone in the dark.

He didn't want Roy to feel like that. 

Gritting his teeth, he limped across the room and when he'd intended to kneel, he crashed hard onto his knees next to Roy. He cursed himself for his decreased motor skills. Roy regarded him by lifting his eyelids, really not sure what he was doing. Jason reached forth an uncertain hand and brushed his fingertips against Roy's stubbled cheek, wiping away liquid that had left a trail in its wake. 

" I really am sorry, Roy," Jason whispered, eyes shifting as their gazes found one another. For a fleeting moment, Roy thought he saw a trace of his Jason in the sea of brokenness, quickly dragged back to the depths by a powerful wave.

" Me too, Jay. I'm sorry that monster ever hurt you and that I never came to save you. And when I tried?" He gave an exasperated scoff and gestured to their surroundings with a jerk of his head.

" Well, look how that ended."

Jason didn't answer for he didn't have one, he just listened to the sound of their breath intertwining in the cold air, his raspier than Roy's.

The zip tie strained as he swallowed against it.

" Can't you get that off?"

Jason almost nodded but then shook his head. " Not allowed."

Anger tugged at Roy's heart, barely believing every fucked up rule Sionis had had the audacity and sheer cruelty to enforce into Jason with whips and knives. Behind his eyes all he could see was crimson spreading across the floor, mingling with dirt and the screams from all the times he could imagine Jason had protested to something. 

" If I had both my arms, or if I could move, I'd hug you right now." Roy pushed a sad smile, trying to make menial light of the situation.

Jason considered what the appropriate reaction would be in the sparse second he allowed himself, before he leaned closer and carefully, very carefully, enlaced Roy in a loose embrace that he hoped would be accepted.

Much to his relief and partial surprise, the archer nuzzled against the base of his neck and breathed a shuddery sigh that made goose-bumps bristle across Jason skin, though he didn't know why. 

Then all Jason felt was the close proximity of their heartbeats and the way the hammering was almost deafening. 

Soon Roy raised his head and gentle as a summer breeze, touched his lips against Jason's so lightly that it could have been mistaken for the beat of a butterfly's wings. Jason could have backed away or stopped him, but his limbs remained paralysed and his mouth unresponsive to the alien sensation of affection.

He almost dallied on if this was allowed or not but the notion barely registered in his mind before he found it within his old self to kiss back. 

There was no vehemence to the gesture, it was simply to comfort, yet the brush of life against Jason was enough to mask the pain and trauma for a few blissful seconds.

 

* * *

 

Through the hidden cameras in the room and wiretaps in Jason's body, Sionis observed Harper manage to steal a kiss from his boy and it made him break the pencil he'd been toying with clean in two. He pressed his thumb down on the sharpened end, drawing beads of blood as he seethed inwardly, bubbling like a cauldron when Jason dared to return to his slut roots and accept the archer's lips against his own, even showing signs of reciprocation. 

When he had the brat within hands reach again, Sionis was going to remind him whose bitch he was in ways he wouldn't forget for a spell.

But through his burning anger, he made the observation that Jason was solaced by Harper's presence to a degree and that, if anything, was an interesting learn. Of course it should have been expected, they used to date and all, but here he saw the opportunity he'd been looking for.

He smiled a sharp-toothed grin when he realised he could make them break each other.

Sionis leaned over to where he had left his phone and made a call.

 

* * *

 

" Harper," Sionis wolf-like snarl emanated from behind his mask as he re-entered the room, hands behind his back and stroll nonchalant. Everything about his body language could mislead someone into believing all was well, even when the worst things he could do to them were swirling around his head.

He was carrying a duffel bag with him that contained a few items, but by the sagging outlines it must have been mostly empty.

" We need a private chat." Mask ignored the murderous glare the archer cast him and turned his attention to Jason, jerking his head towards the door.

" _Get_. I'll deal with you later."

Wordless the way Sionis liked him, Jason didn't hesitate in scampering off to await his next set of orders. He brushed past Sionis on his way out and closed the door, going no further than the other side of it.

Once they were alone, Mask turned his strange combination of a leer and grin to Roy, whose expression wasn't mixed, vice versa to his. The intense hatred poured off Harper in waves. They could both agree that they despised the other for reasons other than Jason's ownership, though that was a key element.

" What the fuck do you want, Mask?" Roy spat, as if completely oblivious to his great disadvantage should the other choose to repay his ill mannerism. He made it his business not to satisfy scumbags with fear, because he wasn't scared.

" You know," Sionis started, tilting his head to the side, " Jason used to say things like that. Turns out, he was a lot less to say when he's got that pretty mouth stuffed." There was no question as to what lewdity he meant by that.

" I bet it made you feel all macho," Roy said with a sarcastic smirk and loathing emerald hues, " that he couldn't fight you off him. Oh, yeah, you're a big man, Roman Sionis."

" Let's not pretend like that whore wasn't desperate. He practically threw himself into my arms and if you're all he had, I'm not surprised. Prancin' around with that pretty face and tight jeans, he was asking for it... A man's not responsible for mounting a bitch like that."

" I swear, once I get outta these damn ropes, I'm gonna choke you on those words." Roy hissed through his clenched teeth with all the conviction of a promise. Sionis looked amused with his teetering smirk.

" Ever heard some of the rumours about our dear Red Hood?" He inquired too sweetly, veering off the original topic like a runaway train.

Roy narrowed his eyes to slits, not humouring him with a response and Sionis went on.

" For instance, who is he? One outstanding theory I've found to be quite interesting is that he used to be the Bat's little bitch, Robin."

Roy's glower deepened into something monstrous.

" And if you've ever spent a moment in Arkham with the Joker, you hear all sorts of interesting things about the second Robin. Such as, the way he screamed like a girl every time he was hit with a crowbar."

" Are going something with this, Mask?" Roy demanded darkly. " Or do you just get off on recounts of sadism?"

" Straight to the point! That might be the only thing I like about your Harper. Well, that and the fact that you're easy to manipulate."

" What the fuck are you talk—"

Sionis dropped the bag grasped in his fisted hand onto the ground with a solid metallic thud from the object inside it. He pulled back the zipper and reached in, quickly returning with a thick iron object Roy took half a second to realise was a crowbar.

He didn't know what Sionis was planning just yet, but his blood froze in his veins regardless.

" I need you, Harper, to take our precious Jason on a trip down memory lane." He gestured with the crowbar and inclined it towards the bound archer ever so slightly, leaving no question as to what his deranged mind now wanted. He dared to continue smiling.

" Fuck you!" Roy exclaimed with fire and fury. " There's no way in hell I'm hurting Jason for you!"

" Oh?" Sionis grinned with the all-knowing nature of the devil as he reached into trousers pocket and took out a phone. He switched it on, unlocked the screen, and turned it to face Roy.

" How about now?"

Roy stared at footage taken through the scope of a sniper's rifle in pure, silent horror. It was homed through a tower block window and fixed on the head of a little girl who was completely oblivious to it, playing with her Barbies on the living room floor.

_Lian._

" This feed is live." Sionis made sure to add. " I've given orders to shoot unless I call him off in ten minutes. Also, should I say, come to an unfortunate end, that order remains. Be smart now, Harper," he tipped his head and ran his tongue along his charred lips. " What's it gonna be?"

Lips trembling, Roy dragged his eyes, wide with fear for his daughter, from the screen to meet Sionis's, who already knew he had won.

 

* * *

 

" _Jason_!"

The sudden and loud exclamation of his name, though not unusual, made Jason jump on fright a little and he quickly rushed back into the room to receive his Sir's commands.

When Jason stepped into the living room, he was greeted by a strange and worrying sight that exuded a threatening presence in overwhelming quantities. Sionis stood aside with his hands behind his back, no doubt smiling beneath his mask, and Roy had been released from the totem pole. A crowbar was hanging from his one remaining hand, that gripped it tightly with a trembling hold.

His freckled face was laden with guilt and some tormented expression Jason couldn't name.

" R — Roy?" Jason looked towards him before Sionis, which further drove an icy wedge into Roy's already breaking heart. There was confusion and then misplaced trust in his eyes.

" Hurry up, Harper," Sionis's hateful voice called from the side. " Ten minutes is almost up."

" I'm so sorry, baby." Shaking his head, Roy strained with tears glistening in his gaze and weighing down the words.

" Wh—"

_Smack!_

Roy swung the crowbar into Jason's ribcage, agonising them both with the solid thud and explosion of pain. The claws caught his flesh and tore a portion of it away. He fell but managed to catch himself with his hands and Jason didn't scream as it came down across his back, he was too afraid to. He was hyperventilating and shaking, his mind tearing apart as he couldn't understand why Roy was doing this.

He was terror-stricken. 

" Beat the bitch harder, Harper." Sionis ordered, disapproving of the Roy visibly held back. It didn't make for very entertaining watching and he was growing disinterested. If Harper continued with this lame performance, then the brains of a six-year-old splattered on a wall would certainly add interest to the equation.  

" I'm sorry, Jay-" Roy sobbed in between the blows he was forced to harden, until he felt Jason's bones breaking beneath the crowbar. " He's going to kill Lian if I don't!"

After the first few hits the crowbar came back bloody and by now, Jason was crying out. Roy prayed he would fight back but he remained on the floor, taking the strikes like he'd been taught to. Roy was nauseous by the stench of blood, the screams, and the horrible solid feel of the iron hitting his flesh, the sound it made, the way it echoed around the room, it was like listening to a symphony written in hell.

Each blow left an angry garish splotch speckled with multiple hues from greyish to completely black.

" Roy, please," Jason whimpered through tears and the crimson dripping off his body. Everything was going hazy and he could barely keep his blood-stained hands strong enough to support himself. " ... Stop.." 

Roy gritted his teeth and aimed Jason's middle with a sharp whack, silencing his pleads and replacing them with another scream turned groan. The knife in his heart twisted and he kept focusing the blows to parts of Jason's body where they would cause the least damage, but every bash ripped skin away or broke a bone. After the eleventh or thirteenth one, he couldn't do it anymore.

" Fuck you, Sionis! I'm not doing this anymore!" Roy screamed, throwing the red-stained crowbar across the room with a sharp metallic clink.

Jason was shuddering uncontrollably at his feet, his breaths coming too short and too deep. His limbs trembled and he fearfully dragged himself away when Roy tried to kneel beside him, torn muscles barely doing his bidding. 

" Don't - c - come near - m - me." Hyperventilation hitched his voice and instead of Roy's grief-stricken face streaming with tears, all the saw was the crowbar swinging down at him mercilessly.

" Baby, please, I had to! He was going to kill Lian!" Roy cried, desperate to make him understand despite how Jason's new and extreme terror of him made that impossible. He had just earned Jason's trust, just kissed him softly to make the pain go away, and now he had been made to beat him bloody. 

Sionis observed them, pleased with the results of this experiment. As he had expected, Jason was reduced to a petrified mess by just a few blows and although he would have enjoyed doing it himself, it was far more traumatizing if his beloved Harper would be the one to hurt him.

Even with the failing techno-organic substance and remnants of the Lazarus Pit in his blood that would help him to heal fast from the assault, the mental scars would remain. 

He cracked his knuckles, smiling at Harper's stupid attempts to get through to Jason and Jason incoherently begging him to get away while he struggled with the pain and dizziness. 

This was just the first in a series of similar things he had planned.

He could break them, yes, but they could heal so long as they had each other.

It was Black Mask's mission to make sure they didn't even have that. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Please comment and let me know what you think. And be honest with me guys, someone told me I write weirdly and have strange descriptions, is that true?


	11. Chapter 11

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Gah!! You changed the name of this story! Yes, I did. Now deal with it.

_For the first few days after Sionis fucked him, Jason was, for lack of a better word, numb. He stumbled around like a zombie, giving and receiving orders without really processing any of the information passing through him. Nothing made a mental registration, everything was reduced to a rehearsed mechanical routine where he only did what he had to and avoided Sionis like the plague, taking great care to never be alone with him. That was a hard goal to achieve, however, as the masked man purposefully cornered him every chance he got. It hadn't gotten sexual since then, but that didn't stop Sionis from gleaning gratification from the knowledge that Jason might actually be a little afraid of him._

_Whenever Jason told himself he in fact wasn't, the memory of being helpless, crushed and suffocated beneath Sionis's considerable weight came back to him._

_To his core, he felt icy and when he was free, he spent hours beneath the shower's hot stream of water and tried to return warmth to his body. He would stand there until the water ran cold and often times long after that, thinking back on Mask's hand dragging back his hair to control his movements and the hiss of his breath in his ear._

_On several occasions, Jason had almost gone up to Sionis's office with his Beretta and blown his abuser's brains out just to regain some sort of control, but Bruce was expecting him to complete this mission and if there's one thing he had learned from his mentor, it was that the mission always comes first. He just had to stomach what Mask had done and get on with it._

_Like Bruce would._

_Although, he knew Bruce would never be in the same predicament as him._

_It wasn't him, it wasn't Red Hood, to play the victim card anyway, so a week later he decided to simply not. He pushed the incident out of his mind and went back to bashing in heads and making snarky quips in between blows like nothing ever happened._

**_That_ ** _was the Jason Todd thing to do._

 _Just days later Sionis started blackmailing him into having sex with him, unless he wanted the whole of Gotham, Batman included, to know what had transpired_.

_And Jason would die before he let anyone discover that._

* * *

It had been peculiar, Sionis would admit, that from the moment he had the kid by his side, Batman left him and his operations alone. He picked up on it in the first few weeks of Jason's employment and quickly realised it was a huge advantage, despite not knowing then what the Bat's connection was to his boy. So he played along, pretended not to notice, all the while being suspicious of Jason's true intentions while under his wing.

Mask sectioned information, made sure no one ever knew absolutely everything, including his second. It's how he managed to stay ten steps ahead of anyone dumb enough to try take on his empire. Or at least, that's how he preferred to play it, but the problem was, he and Batman were much alike. Men who prioritised strategy and knowledge, they thought similar to each other and that made them predictable to one another.

In the past, he wouldn't have given a damn about that, but then a kid wearing the bat symbol across his chest came snooping around and suddenly Sionis decided to take precautions. He left his comfort zone and indulged in things that seemed random when in truth they were the means to keep his enemy guessing his next move.

That wasn't necessary for long however, since Jason's oblivion to his suspicions made it easy to feed him bogus info from time to time. It kept his business safe.

Jason was like bat repellent and worth keeping around just for that reason, but that was before Batman suspected anything had gone south for his underling.

And now? The Bat was turning every stone in the search for him and Sionis was back to evading him best he could the old fashioned way.

Even with his enemy now aware of Jason's true predicament, the kid still had an untold amount of value to Sionis. He was leverage. If Batman got too close, he would simply put a bullet in Jason's shoulder and make sure his daddy knew the next shot would be more to the left. Mask wasn't so attached to the boy that he wouldn't treat him to a buckshot if it proved beneficial.

As he ran every development of his plan through his mind, Sionis's eyes absently drifted to Jason, whose hand floated above the lever, conflicted and hesitant. Even after Harper whacked him repeatedly with a crowbar, he was reluctant to pull down on the lever that would return the favour and light the archer up with over two hundred volts of electricity. 

He had loyalty, at least.

Much like Jason had in the past, Roy was fastened to a reclining chair with restrains across his remaining limbs and midriff. Originally a plastic stick had been stuffed between his teeth but he'd stupidly spat it out so he could attempt to convince Jason out of this.

" Please, baby, don't. Don't do what he wants!" Roy pleaded, more for Jason's sake than his own. He would never forgive himself for what Mask had blackmailed him into and he didn't want Jason bearing the same colossal weight on his conscience.

Jason stared at him with a dead expression, slowly lowering his hand onto the lever and curling his fingers around it until his knuckles cracked, one by one. The bruises and abrasions across his back burned and twisted with the memory of their origin.

" Hurry up, son." Sionis gave a breathy, vexed sigh, pinching the bridge of his nose hard. Any other day he would have had the patience to taunt and manipulate them for hours, but he'd barely gotten an hour of sleep the previous night and a skull-crushing migraine was setting in.

" _Jason_ , obey." He ordered when the boy still wouldn't listen. The singular word had been engrained into Jason's head to overwrite anything else he may have been thinking and tunnel vision in on commands. Like always, it worked like a charm and Jason yanked his arm down.

Instantly the room went up in bright flashes of lightning and the archer's screams. He convulsed and thrashed as currents ripped through him and the restraints held firm. Blood poured from his mouth from where his jaws clamped shut on his tongue and sank into it.

The sight and smell of burning flesh reminded Sionis of the electro-shock therapy that had played a major part in making Jason as compliant as a puppy. With or without Pyg, he felt confident it would work with Harper, too. Much as he was fond of Jason's qualities, he still required a replacement for when the boy was well and truly done. Still keep him around for sex and as a trophy, but an asset in the field he was not.

Harper would be perfect.

However, after going over Pyg's notes and recounts of everything he did to Jason, Sionis realised he may have made a mistake in having the professor killed. The steps were complex, far more than just physical torture. The drugs and psychological obliteration would be considerably harder to achieve, but Jason could help with the psychological parts, at least. There were few things as trauma-inducing as a loved one putting you through hell.

Sionis focussed his gaze harder on Harper's seizing form and his migraine intensified. It had taken months to condition Jason and that was _with_ Pyg's professional assistance, he may not have that time to use on Harper with the Bat closing in. The knowledge that he would kill Jason kept him at bay for now, but that wouldn't work forever.

He needed to think. 

* * *

 

Nightwing pulled his fist from the man's face and dropped him to the alley floor. He was walking away before he even heard the unconscious body fall. Blood was streaked across his knuckles and his muscles were tensed, hard as rock while his desperation to find his brother, and then anger when he couldn't, kept doubling in size.

That had been the last one. The last guy who had worked closely enough with Black Mask to have any sort of idea where he could be. And nothing.

Nightwing and Batman had picked apart every one of Sionis's buildings and his hired stooges, left no stone unturned.

And no one knew a thing.

He had _promised_ Jason, given him his word that everything would be fine, and now he couldn't even find him to apologise.

" 'M sorry, Little Wing." Nightwing muttered under his breath for the umpteenth time as he mounted his motorbike waiting by the road and kicked the leg out. The engine roared to life and he started towards the secret vehicle entrance in Robinson Park, one leading directly beneath Gotham and to the heart of the Bat's base of operations.

He needed to brief his father in on what they had both known from the start, would be a dead end. Dead ends, false hope, and over a week into their abduction, and Bruce still refused to get the Justice League or even Oliver involved for some retarded reason that Dick barely understood.

Batman wanted to _contain_ the situation, not blow it out of proportion.

Roy's and his own son's lives were hanging in the balance and he thought it was no big deal. Dick was driven beyond anger by the idea that his stubborn, control freak father figure childishly didn't want help. And after Dick had 'stupidly gotten Roy involved', Bruce had outright warned him not to call on anyone else. 

If ever there was a time to see eye-to-eye, it would be now. Jason needed them to work together and they couldn't even manage that.

With a signal from his bike, the hidden door in the park lifted up from the grass-covered ground and he zoomed in, the wind whipping his hair and thoughts into one big, scrambled mess. 

Nightwing twisted the handlebar further and revved into the Cave, the noise from the bike filling every inch of it and bouncing it back off the walls. He pulled up beside the Batmobile and got off his ride, removing his helmet and tucking it beneath his arm as he approached the many bright monitors by the computer table.

Bruce was working on something concerning Jason, fingers darting across his keyboard and set gaze fixed on the screens, working at an inhumane speed that would put Flash to shame.

He didn't acknowledge Dick's arrival and Dick nodded his greeting towards the two new people who had joined the scene.

Tim Drake and Damian Wayne.

They were standing side by side, awaiting an order from Bruce. Damian's small face was twisted into a leer and his brow was so heavily furrowed that it obscured his sight. He gripped the handle of his sword like he was expecting to use it soon.

By Tim's expression, his older brother could tell he wasn't really sure where his motivation for this one laid. He and Jason weren't exactly buddy-buddy and he doubtfully was capable of imagining Jason in a position where he direly needed help. Were the information not coming from Bruce, Tim would have thought it was a joke.

And Bruce had only told them what they needed to know. He hadn't gone into the details or the extent of what Sionis had done.

" That lead came up empty, Bruce," Dick told him, standing behind him with one hand laying at a rest on his hip.

" They're not in Gotham any more." He went on.

" I know. I've expanded the search radius to nationwide." His gruff voice sounded somehow gruffer as he spoke. Dick knew it was meant to disguise his concern for his missing son.

" So, because that stupid failure Todd, got himself captured by Black Mask," Damian's irritable tone grated against Dick's raw nerves as he started.

" We need to waste our time and run around the country trying to find him? Let him solve his own mess, Father. Surely he is capable of even that."

" He's an ally, Damian," Bruce stalled before he could gather the willpower to add the last, " he's family. We're going to look for him and we _will_ find him."

" I just... can't believe it." Tim said, shaking his head as he stared at the ground, arms folded. There was something about his expression that Dick couldn't name. Disbelief, but something more. " Jason can fight his way outta anything, including death. How the hell did Black Mask get the jump on him?"

" I told you, Tim," Bruce replied, already having returned to his work on the computers. Like always, he didn't sound to be in a patient mood. " He was injured."

Dick thought back on his brother's body trembling in his arms the night he found him in Roy's apartment, terrified out of his wits. Saying he was injured was an appalling understatement, but a necessary one so long as they didn't want Damian and Tim knowing the extent of trauma Jason was received by Mask's hand. Jason wouldn't want them to know it.

" He was in a really bad way, Tim." Dick explained with sincerity that made Tim believe every word, even if he still couldn't picture Jason in the act of being helpless.

" What do we do now, B? Can we finally get the League or for god's sake, even Green Arrow involved?" Nightwing demanded instead of asking, his tone pushing boundaries Robin would never have dared to. However, if he truly was as uncaring about Bruce's opinions as he liked to think he was, then he wouldn't have taken the warning to keep this in the family.

" No. If we get the League involved, then Black Mask will quadruple his defences as well, and we'll never get to Jason."

" What about Queen, Father?" Damian asked from beside him, having to tip his head all the way back just to meet his father's eyes.

" His prime objective should be to protect Lian, in case Sionis goes after her. We're not telling Oliver about this, _yet_. The League will be notified and called upon only if it's absolutely necessary. In the meantime, Dick, Damian, I have a series of locations the two of you will scout out for possible leads. Tim, I need you to rerun..." 

Bruce's orders trailed off in Dick's mind and he inwardly blew his cheeks out. They were just spinning their tyres on a bank of wet mud because Sionis and Bruce thought alike. It was a contest of strengths when they were both equally powered. If one was to win, then they needed a game changer and soon.

Dick just hoped they would get to it before Mask.

But somehow he doubted it.

* * *

 

It was the cruellest game Roy could have ever imagined and it spoke volumes of the man who whose mind brewed it.

A screen displayed Lian and Oliver, filmed unbeknownst to them while they walked through a park. Lian was holding Oliver's hand in one of hers and an ice cream in the other, that's melting surface was leaving a trail of sticky white vanilla on her chin. Again, the footage came through the scope of a sniper's rifle trained on Roy's daughter's head but the many trees that dotted the natural reserve obscured the man's aim, sometimes for minutes. When they were visible, however, Roy was supposed to pull down on the lever that activated a winch hanging from the ceiling. The winch cable was looped around Jason's neck and would hoist him up every time it was actuated, strangling him until the sniper lost sight of them again and Roy could release him, only to start up again seconds later when they came into view.

It was the most torturous thing Sionis could have done to him, especially since he knew Roy would always choose to protect his daughter before anything else.

The black masked sadist wasn't present for this session, but two guards were, just to make sure Roy didn't slack of on torturing Jason for even a single round. If he did, it would end with a bullet in Lian's head.

His fingers trembled on the handle of the lever, palms sweating as he stared anxiously at the screen, desperate for the trees to come back. Jason's spluttering drags of air and thrashing were lessening and lessening, agonising Roy to an unbearable extent.

When finally he was able to wrench the lever back, the cable unwound fast and Jason hit the ground with a loud thud, not picking himself up even after the first few seconds. He gasped and coughed, fumbling with the noose in an effort to loosen it and allow himself a few breaths before - 

The trees parted again and Jason was yanked back up into the air. The pressure closed around his throat and he kicked and struggled despite the futile nature of his resisting. The whole weight of his body was focused on his neck and he feared the drag would twist his head off or break his spine. The pressure building up behind his eyes was bursting capillaries in his head.

Everything was going black and his limbs were slackening until the cable was released and he fell again, only he didn't bother with the noose, just dragged in whatever few breaths he could until the loop continued itself.

Tears pricked Roy's cracking emerald eyes and he felt a rope of his own tighten around his throat every time he was forced to subject Jason to this cruel insanity.  In this particular instance, Ollie and Lian remained in the line of fire for a minute.

Two minutes.

However long it was it was too much. Jason had stopped moving and his lips were several shades into becoming blue. His arms hung limply at his sides as the rope slowly turned him and Roy kept praying, pleading with any higher power that some sort of cover would present itself again and soon.

His tongue darted across his dry, chapped lips.

_Three minutes._

That was bad. After the fourth one, severe brain damage and organ failure would set it.

At the first hint that the sniper lost his aim, Roy disconnected power to the winch and ran to Jason before his body could even hit the floor, because Oliver and Lian had left the park, that meant the game was over and he could move. 

" Nonononono. Jason!" Roy pulled his limp form into his embrace and shook him best he could with one arm, but he flopped from side to side like a dead fish. Roy put him back down and struggled to get his fingers beneath the noose, but once he did, he dragged it open and over Jason's head. 

He still wasn't waking up.

Roy lowered his mouth over Jason's and blew, pushing air in and out of his lungs while the guards stared like a couple of dumb oxen, not comprehending how Sionis would react if his boy died on their watch. 

Again, nothing. 

Panicking and seconds away from hysterics, Roy clenched his fist and punched Jason square in the chest, right above his heart. He jerked upward, but that was only due to the impact.

" C'mon, baby, please." He pitifully pleaded through a haze of tears, raising his hand and hitting Jason again. This time, Roy felt his ribs shift and dislocate beneath the force but still he wouldn't open his eyes or breathe for himself.

After the third strike, Jason started to cough violently, choking up small speckles of blood, but it was the single most beautiful, relieving thing Roy had ever heard. Roy shuddered from the overwhelming relief and hugged Jason to himself, forgetting for a few seconds that he couldn't give him a secure embrace anymore, only a one-armed mockery of comfort. 

He grit his teeth as Jason difficultly adjusted himself to look up at him.

" G - _ginger_?" Jason struggled to push the name off his tongue, delirious and at a drift before the oxygen properly returned to his brain. 

Roy almost cried when Jason called him that, the pet name he'd been given on their first mission together, far too long ago. He knew Jason was only using it because he was disorientated and when he returned to his enforced, twisted senses, he wouldn't utter it again. 

" Yeah, Jay. It's me." 

* * *

 

Nightwing transformed into Dick Grayson as he stepped into his apartment and pulled his mask off his face, an invisible trail of spirit gum remaining behind to stain his features. He half-heartedly kicked the door closed behind himself and walked into the dark interior of his home with heavy footsteps, dragging his feet like they were weighed by lead ballast. He didn't bother with turning the lights on or doing anything about how hungry he was, he just slumped down onto the couch because it was all he had energy left for after four days of relentless searching with no sleep or progress to show for it.

Bruce had uncharacteristically taken an interest in his wellbeing and ordered him to go home and get at least three hours of shuteye. Dick had almost scoffed aloud. As if his father would ever take his own advice.

But he wasn't entirely at a disagreement with that. He could rest a fraction better if he knew Bruce was still looking for Jason when he was enacting nothing because of his dumb exhaustion. 

Still, he didn't think he could sleep.

Not with the mental images of Sionis hurting his brother and Roy going through his head at light speed. Nightwing had come across the corpse of a man one night on patrol, tortured beyond human recognition. He later discovered that the poor soul had stolen a barely noticeable amount of money from Black Mask, and if what he had witnessed was the result of such a small wrongdoing, he didn't even want to imagine what would happen to those who had personally insulted the crime lord.

Like Jason and now Roy had.

Groaning, Dick rolled onto his stomach and rested his chin on the couch's armrest, staring at the window that showcased the city of Blüdhaven at the only time it ever seemed to sleep, and that was only from the perception of a person who didn't go out crime-fighting every night. 

In truth, when the sun went down, the city was at its worse.

He kept tossing from one angle to another. No matter what position he rolled into, he couldn't get comfortable enough to actually sleep. Like right now, he'd returned to laying on his back and his escrima sticks were stabbing him in the kidneys.

And he didn't give half a damn. 

Dick tried to close his eyes and keep them that way, but every time his mind went blank another wave of images and thoughts bombarded him until he roused himself enough to process them, and then the cycle just began again.

He was around thirty minutes into the torturous loop when something truly worth considering occurred to him. 

Lian.

Roy had left Lian with Oliver. Bruce was afraid Mask would be targeting Lian....

Dick sat up as he ploughed through the thought further, frowning to himself as he turned it over in his mind again and again.

The idea that Sionis would go after a little girl wasn't far-fetched in the least, which meant he had to have operatives in Star City right now to enact his purposes if need be. It might be the only place his operations had left a carbon footprint big enough to follow to a second location, wherever that may be.

Fuelled by the possibility of a new lead, Dick grabbed his gear hastily and returned into the night. In the next few minutes, he'd retrieved his motorcycle from the floor hidden beneath the garage and was darting through the streets of his city.

 _To hell with sleep_ , he thought to himself as stared at the road ahead through to visor of his helmet.

To hell with everything that stood in the way of him finding his brother. Coincidentally, hell was exactly where he planned on sending Sionis when this was all over and dealt with, with no fucking regard for Bruce's number one rule.

* * *

 

Cold, dead, sociopathic eyes that weren't Jason's stared through Roy as the red-hot iron sat nestled in the cup of his hand radiated an unbearable, hellish heat.

Roy once more found himself restrained to the totem in the room disguised as a lavish place to entertain guests, when in truth it had the means to a numberless amount of torture. The winch still dangled from the ceiling, taunting them with the reminder.

He couldn't move and Jason wasn't listening to him any more, not after the things Sionis had made him do. He held the glowing orange brand he'd heated in the embers of the hearth, considering Roy with a stare that came through his lashes. There were two capital block letters on the end of the iron.

_BM._

_Black Mask._

" Baby, please don't. He's not here now, he can't hurt you." Roy tried to convince Jason with a pathetic argument, even when he knew well enough that Jason was acting out a list of instructions given to him by Sionis, before he left. Jason wasn't restrained during his absence because Mask knew, he wouldn't dare try anything. He was a good little puppy, patiently awaiting his master's return.

Jason extended his arm and with it, the iron until Roy could feel the heat of it stinging the stubble on his cheek and leaving his skin rosy red. It hovered less than an inch away from his face.

" Jason.." Was all Roy said before Jason thrust the brand against his cheek, searing away his flesh upon immediate contact. Roy screamed and the air was filled with the miasma of cooking meat and sizzling of his burning skin. He thrashed in the throes of agony but despite the struggling, Jason held the brand to his face forcefully, mechanically. Pain receptors exploded into overdrive in Roy's head. His heart pounded but he'd stopped breathing at some point where it hadn't registered.

No emotion crossed Jason's features, even when he finally pulled the iron away, leaving two ugly letters seared into Roy. The wound was bright red and charred black on the edges.

Roy felt drunk off the pain, it consumed every inch of his being. It hurt worse than the electrocution, much worse. He relied entirely on the ropes to keep him upright. Leaning on them with his whole weight compressed his ribcage and fired up many older injuries.

Black Mask's name engraved into his face hurt more than the burn itself.

Because it was permanent.

He heard Jason put away the iron and move across the room. Roy groggily swam around in an ocean of pain and didn't pay him any heed until the soft ruffling of fabric filled his ears. He raised his head, red fringe parting like a veil to give him a visual of Jason, pulling his shirt over his head and swishing it into a crumpled mess on the floor. 

" W - what are you doing?" Roy weakly asked and the effort was almost too great. The heat had drained from his body and left him icy and trembling. His breath kept shuddering.

Jason didn't tell him, didn't satisfy his curiosity just yet. As he approached, too slowly to be mistaken for human movements, Roy's eyes fell on the scars littering his torso. They were jagged, knotted, some clean and some nothing short of remains of a tear. Others were more purposeful, forming deliberate patterns in his skin. Roy hadn't seen them before because he had refused to watch Sionis's homemade pornos. 

Jason knelt a foot away, staring at Roy until he was forced to meet the unwavering gaze he couldn't name. Jason's eyes were wide but emotionless. 

" It's okay, Roy. Look," Jason said as he stabbed himself in the side with his finger. Roy tracked his movement to the crude white lines he was tracing over his ribs. The scar originated from a knife or scalpel and even with Jason's hand hiding part of it, he could make out the letters clearly. It made something in Roy's chest crumble to dust.

_BM._

It made sense Sionis hadn't branded Jason's face. He wanted Jason nice and pretty.

" Now he owns both of us."

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That first scene is there because it occurred to me some of you may be wondering what transpired after that first night with Sionis. Certainly Jason wouldn't let anyone get away with hurting him? Not unless they have something to blackmail him with and he happens to misunderstand "the mission always comes first".
> 
> As always, give me your thoughts.


	12. Chapter 12

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Jason's condition worsens and Roy is faced with a question with no right answer. Meanwhile, Dick joins Oliver and Lian in Star City.

Jason was never comfortable, or at least, he hadn't been for the past year or so. But this morning was taking it up a notch to new heights. He vaguely remembered falling asleep, curled up on the cold floor of Sionis's bedroom while he waited for his Sir to return, but he awoke on the bed. He didn't remember anyone coming in and moving him, but Sionis had probably had his fun while Jason was unconscious. Assuming he was back, that is.

Jason was cold. Too cold to feel anything but the harsh burning the noose had left in his throat and how sick he felt. Nauseous. Like it took every bit of willpower he had to keep from throwing up, not in Sionis's bed, at least.

Groaning, he pushed himself into a sitting position and to his surprise, he was clothed in the same things he'd been wearing last night, indicating Sionis hadn't fucked him in his sleep. That was strange. Then why was he in the bed? Whatever the reason, Jason didn't feel well enough to dwell on it. He swung his legs over the edge and expected them to take his weight when he tried standing.

But they didn't.

The right one buckled the instant he used it. He fell, more like crashed, forward and collapsed into an undignified mess on his hands and knees. He scraped his palms.

Jason took way too long to process what happened, blinking once, twice, in some dumbfounded state of bewilderment. He felt the effort, the attempt of getting his limb to move, but it was deaf to his body's commands.

Jason shifted his hands, laid out flat on the ground and tried standing again. This time his muscles repaid him with a jarring stab of pain, strong enough to drag a small sharp gasp from his mouth. The coldness seeping into his bones was worsening and the shivers intensifying, on top of that, he was barely keeping his food down. Jason bit down on his lip to keep the revulsion back.

What was wrong with him?

To answer his own question, he remembered what Sir had told him.

_" When you were captured by Batman, he did something to you, now it's breaking you. He injected you with something that's causing massive system failure."_

Of course. Jason had almost forgotten. He was dying or at least breaking, and Sionis had put it.

The taste of salt washed on the back of his throat and the flavour enveloped his mouth. Unwilling tears pricked the corners of his eyes and another wave of nausea made his pounding head swim. Jason groped the edge of the bed and when he got a hold, he tried using it to rediscover his footing, but not before the door swung open and Sionis entered. Hands clasped behind his back, pace slow, nothing about his body language was ever telling of his intentions.

He stopped walking a foot from Jason and Jason felt those heavy crimson eyes land on him, picking him apart from behind the mask. He always felt vulnerable and exposed when that gaze struck him, no matter how many layers he was wearing.

" On the floor like an animal, Jason? If I'd known how much you disliked beds, I woulda taken you down there ages ago." He smirked, as if ever caring about his boy's preferences. His mood changed, however, when Jason looked up at him, all teary-eyed and panicking.

" S - sir, m - my leg's n - not workin'. C - can't stand." His lips trembled as he stammered, giving a wild, uncoordinated gesture to his useless limb. His verbal stumbling would have annoyed Sionis enough to smash his face into the ground on a normal day, although he should have.

Mask thought back on Doctor Hughes telling him the partial paralysis would return with a vengeance, among other issues. He'd suspected something was amiss when he had returned from Gotham the previous night, and found Jason laying cold on the floor.

It was pitiable, honestly.

He would have assumed him dead if he hadn't been shivering so violently. Why had he shown the boy any kind of empathy by lifting him onto the bed and covering him with a blanket? He didn't know but in the grand scheme of things, probably to make Jason realise Sionis was the only person who could take care of him.

In the near future, it would be a very necessary piece of knowledge for him to possess.

" Hmm. Can't walk, eh? Let's have a look." Sionis lowered himself into a crouch beside Jason and placed his hand over his thigh, running it along the muscles and joints. He pressed down with menial force every now and again. Jason gave a small grunt or drew a hiss through his teeth every time he did. But there was a perverted sense of trust in the way he allowed himself to be touched.

" Where does it hurt, son?"

Jason seemed drunk when he clumsily indicated to several points in his leg. Sionis noted that his hand-eye coordination was off too.

" Hurts everywhere, sir." He whined. Mask watched his icy body shaking from cold in the room that was pleasantly warmed by the floor heating. He allowed for his eyes to travel up Jason and rested them on his ashen face, normally aflush with a healthy tan. He reached out a hand and laid it flat on his forehead, almost wincing at how hot it was even through his leather glove.

" Goddamn. You're burnin' up, kid." Sionis rolled his tongue around in his mouth and pressed it into his cheek, thinking. Jason was no good to him sick, and this didn't seem like an ordinary flu. More than likely, it was connected to his system failing.

What was that that Hughes had said? Oh yes. Mask had a month at most until Jason was useless to him, and they were halfway through that time.

" J - just a c - c - cold, sir." As if to deliberately contradict his statement, Jason finished the sentence with a dry cough that quickly turned into a series of wheezing, rattling around loudly in his chest. It wracked his entire being.

" Don't be stupid, Jason." Mask took his arm and pushed him back onto the ground when he tried standing, less than nicely. He briefly thought back on the days when his fingers couldn't completely envelop the boy's forearm. He'd lost more weight than Sionis had realised.

" It's obviously not a cold, you dumb slut." The words left his mouth with a comfortable sense for the natural feeling of calling Jason such profanities, but when Jason stiffened at the insult he reworded. Couldn't have the kid doubting his loyalties now.

" It's not a cold, son."

" Th - then what is it, s - sir?"

Sionis considered him with a long stare before eventually replying.

" It's the malfunctioning. Doctor Hughes said this would happen."

" It - isn't there anything that can be done?"

Probably, Sionis thought to himself, but he'd already spent three million dollars and seven months of his time on the boy and other than for sex, Jason wasn't worth further investment. He could get a bitch anywhere. Even if he was willing to spend more money, Hughes had near promised him that nothing could be done.

This time Sionis didn't bother with a response and eyed him down relentlessly. He was ticked off. This meant he had even less time to enact his plan than he had originally thought. Jason tried to both look up at him and remember he wasn't to make eye contact unless it was ordered, but his head felt too heavy to pay attention to all the rules.

He was so sleepy.

Even with Sionis's larger than life presence he could see himself drifting off for a few minutes if allowed. Eyelids drooping, he'd involuntarily started leaning into nothingness when,

" _Jason_. Don't fall asleep now, son. We have somewhere to be." Then Mask's fingers were around his arm again and pulling him to his feet without much consideration for his poor condition. Jason felt crippled but pushed - _forced_ , himself not to fall again. The first few steps with Sionis to brace him were difficult, his leg felt like he was dragging around nothing but a load of dead weight.

And god, it hurt so much. Like his veins were pumping chunks of glass through his system.

He bit back a whimper, bloodying his lip between his teeth with the effort of not giving Sir a reason to hurt him.

He didn't like it when Jason was weak.

But his body begged him to be weak.

It pleaded with him.

He swayed.

" _Stand_ , boy."

Jason couldn't see his face but heard the warning in his voice and felt the fingers burrowing into his bicep, though the sensation was detached, like an outer body experience.

Jason's field of sight kept swimming and blurring. He leaned too far to his left and would have fallen without Sionis there to hold him.

" 'M sorry, sir." Jason slurred, eyes already rolling back. " ..Can't."

Then he collapsed.

__

* * *

 

" Uncle Dick!" Lian shoved past Oliver to get out of the door and throw her arms around Dick's legs. She burrowed her face into his thigh.

" Monkey!" Dick exclaimed and scooped her up into his arms, bringing her close enough to plant a kiss on her forehead.

Lian hugged him, pressing her cheek into his. Dick noted, that her skin was sticky from whatever treat Oliver had spoiled her with.

" Hey, kid." Oliver smiled. " Long time." He stepped aside and beckoned Dick into the apartment. Still carrying Roy's daughter, Dick stepped past him and offered a smile of his own as the door closed behind.

" Hi, Ollie. Sorry to drop in like this."

" I'm glad you did. Me an' Lian were running outta games, anyway." Oliver explained, mixed golden/blue eyes genuine. Dick couldn't help but enjoy the happiness radiating around the penthouse and off the blond man. He never understood how Oliver Queen always seemed to be happy.

And this was coming from Dick Grayson, the Bat Family's sunshine child.

" Me an' Uncle Ollie played tag and checkers and hide and seek and I won cause Uncle Ollie kept hiding in the same place! In the kitchen!" Lian loudly announced, straight in his ear. Dick winced at the sudden explosion of noise an inch from his head but patted her head. He could actually picture Oliver contorted into a kitchen cupboard while playing hide and seek with the girl.

" That's my monkey. Playing to win, just like I taught ya." Dick cooed and an even broader smile spread across Lian's small round face, showcasing her freckles and laughter lines. She beamed like the sun at even the smallest bit of approval.

" Have you come to play with us?" She hopefully inquired and it was almost too much to turn her down.

" Unfortunately not,"

Lian's face fell before Dick could even finish the sentence.

" I came cause I need a word with Oliver."

" Oh." Was all Lian responded with, crestfallen as she lowered her dark and suddenly sad eyes.

Oliver observed her briefly before with a brand new burst of enthusiasm, suggested,

" How about we watch some Paw Patrol, eh, Lian? See what Ryder and the pups are up to?"

Lian found it within herself to perk up at a record speed.

" Yes! Yes!" She clapped her hands together and Dick could only smile at such innocence.

 

* * *

 

" I assume you're here on behalf of the Bat?" Oliver said, quietly so Lian couldn't hear, although she was in the living room with the TV turned on loud. He and Dick sat on opposing sides around the kitchen table with the coffee Oliver had made growing cold in the matching white mugs before them. As sleep deprived as Dick was, he didn't want coffee. He wanted Jason and Roy home safe.

" No, I'm not." Dick's mind took a brief gander back to Bruce specifically warning him against setting foot in Star City.

" He doesn't know I'm here and if you don't mind, I'd like it to stay that way."

They were both well aware that nothing escaped the Dark Knight's watchful eye, but nonetheless, Oliver nodded.

" Sure thing, kid." He took a sip of his coffee. Like the man himself, the brew was far too sweet. " Got any news on Jason?"

When Dick looked up, surprised, Oliver explained how he knew.

" Roy told me before he left. I haven't gotten word from him since, so I wager you're here because something went awry."

Dick swallowed. Awry was one way to put it. Since Ollie had already pieced this much together, keeping the rest from him was pointless, no matter what Bruce said.

" Black Mask has them both."

Oliver nodded grimly, taking another swig from the mug his hand was enveloped around.

" Figured. I'd have gone to find him by now, if," he gestured towards Lian in the living room, " y'know. Roy told me Sionis might go after her and that no matter what, I was to protect her. I promised him, Dick."

It sounded like he was trying to explain himself.

Dick understood Roy's and Oliver's decisions, of course. Like any good parent, Roy would put Lian's safety before anything.

He was worried Sionis had twisted that around on Roy.

" Your priority needs to be her, Ollie. You keep her safe and we'll find Roy and Jason."

Oliver lifted his gaze from his drink and met Dick's head on. There was an emotion in it not usually associated with the Emerald Archer. Silent seething anger. Oliver was angry at Sionis, and even that, was a possible understatement. But the anger left space for fear, too.

Oliver was scared for Roy and Jason. That was more than Bruce had shown.

" I know. I trust you."

Dick couldn't help but wonder if that extended to the whole Bat Family, or just him. It was no secret that Oliver and Bruce were on rough terrain with one another. In fact, they pretty much hated each other. Some unsolved past conflict, no doubt. It had and still did to a degree, add some strain to Roy's and Jason's relationship.

" I was hoping I could find something in Star City that I could track to Sionis." Dick explained. " Chances are, he's got operatives planted here. I mean, he knew where Roy was when he ambushed him."

Ollie hummed in agreement, understanding. " Find an operative, get him to spill on Sionis's whereabouts."

" Or at least, get a clue where to get the next clue. Black Mask is not in the business of telling his underlings anything that could potentially be compromising for him. I do need to warn you, though," he said, tone shifting as if he was warning of a terrible storm to come. " He might take the fight to Lian once he's cornered."

Oliver's face had transformed into a hideous scowl. His voice was a low, foreboding growl when he spoke.

" He can try."

Dick knew Oliver would give his own life before he let anything happen to Lian. Though she and everyone else referred to him as "uncle Ollie", Dick wagered he viewed himself as her grandfather instead. Roy had been his son, once upon a time. Or maybe he still was. Dick didn't know how their relationship was of late.

" He will." Dick could almost promise that, with no sense of gratification as he did.

* * *

 

The teeth of little demons gnawed away at Roy's face, or at least, that's what it felt like. The brand was a day old and the pain hadn't lessened. If anything, it was worse. He could feel it stretching across his cheekbone to where the ends of it touched his lower jaw. One-fourth of his face was now dominated by that crime lord's ugly name.

It was tingling, itching, burning, festering.

And he still found the energy to be consumed by rage.

If it was the last thing he ever did, Roy was going to hang Mask by his guts from the tallest building in Gotham. His own HQ.

Roy planned and visualised his vengeance the whole way an armed guard hauled him down the hall, but when he was shoved into the room with Sionis, his arm awkwardly bound behind his back, all his focus snapped to Mask's two lackeys, collecting Jason off the floor. He was unconscious, his face was a deathly white pallor and it was clear something was really wrong with him. Roy couldn't tell if he was breathing or not.

" What the hell have you done to him?!" Roy lunged for Sionis, spectating idly by, and was stopped only by the man who escorted him here. His remaining arm was grabbed roughly and he was yanked back into his place. He watched in helpless, all-consuming worry as the guards carried Jason between them, past him and out of the door to destinations unknown.

" I wouldn't worry about him, Harper." Sionis said, turning to him. There was nothing in his voice that suggested he cared about Jason, even when he'd looked so sick. Roy had always known Sionis didn't care, but somehow this drove the point across harder.

" When you've got your own future to be scared about." He finished. Roy could feel his intense, unrelenting stare through the mask, fixed on the brand. He glanced over his shoulder, trying to lay his eyes on Jason, but he was no longer within sight. 

Where had they taken him? 

But more importantly, what was wrong with him?

The archer could do nought but hope Jason had been roofied for Sionis's somnophiliac pleasures, but it certainly hadn't looked that way. And even as the best case scenario that was a terrible situation to picture Jason in. Although, he knew with grim certainty that it had happened a numberless amount of times.

" Well, I ain't fuckin' scared of _you_." Roy retorted once he returned his attention to the other.  There was bite to his last few words, a snap. 

" Oh, is that, so?" He tilted his head. Before Roy could step out of the way, not that the guard would have allowed it, Sionis's hand had lurched forward and was on his cheek. The brush of the cold leather glove on his raw flesh made it burn worse, but he sank his teeth into his lip to stifle the whimper that tried escaping from his mouth. He refused to give Sionis the satisfaction of making him cry out.

" Goddamn..." Sionis mumbled to himself, taking in the scale and depth of the burn. It was raw and looked like it was getting infected. He made a mental note to order Hughes to tend to it. He could hardly have his new asset's face rotting off.

" Why so surprised?" Roy jerked his head to the side, away from the gloved hand. He gave a cynical smirk to go with his eyes, oozing hatred. " You told Jason to do it."

" I ordered him to brand you, I never said your face. Jason made that choice by himself." Mockery, there was nothing by mockery in the way he said that. Roy refused to let the fucker get to him. That's what he was doing, after all, trying to get under his skin. Jason would never hurt him unless he was made to and the memory of how hard he pushed the red-hot iron into Roy's face… it had to be an order Jason was terrified to disobey.

"  That's a load of bull." Roy spat in response. Sionis watched him through the glass covered slits in his mask, considering him for a moment before he gestured with a tip of his head for the guard to get out. 

The man wasted no time in disappearing behind the closed door.

Roy shifted against his restraints when it slammed loudly shut, suddenly aware of how alone they were. 

In Roman Sionis's bedroom, of all places.

" I have a question for you, sonny. And if you know what's best for your pretty little girl, you better give me what I want to hear." Their eyes met, or so Roy wagered, even if he couldn't see those devilish crimson hues through the mask. The tension was building like the guitar strings being tightened, growing taut until Roy was sure something would snap. He wished the man would just ask his damned question already.

" What's Batman's real name?"

Roy felt his heart drop from his chest and land somewhere in his belly. He'd known Sionis wanting to know was inevitable, just as he knew what would happen to Lian if he refused to tell. Maybe if he pretended not to know Bruce Wayne was Batman?

" Why the fuck would I know?" He asked dryly, narrowing his eyes ever so slightly to stare through his red lashes. 

" You're Green Arrow's former bitch, I'm sure your daddy's let the Bat's identity slip one drunken night. He'd tell his pretty little ginger anything, wouldn't he? Any time you mewled out what you want..."

Roy suppressed the repulsion rising up his throat. He was disgusted by what this human trashcan was implying his and Oliver's strictly platonic relationship had been. He could feel the ghost of his amputated arm's hand clenching and opening on repeat, could even feel the knuckles cracking as his fist tightened. 

" Just had to get down on your knees, open that lovely mouth, and soon you'd have the bastard babbling out all kinds of secrets, right? So tell me," he snatched Roy's face in his hand, burrowing his thumb into the brand. He turned his digit to dig the corner of his fingernail into the raw flesh, drawing drops of blood even while wearing gloves. Roy couldn't muffle the soft moan of pain that wanted to turn into a scream. 

" Who. Is. Batman? Or do you want your pretty princess's brains staining the wall?"

The archer kept a calm outlook, appearing cool as a cucumber when inwardly he was panicking. He was going to do everything in his power to keep Lian safe but giving Sionis what he wanted would spell disaster not only for Batman but for a countless number of others, as well. 

Dick, Tim, Damian, Babs, Cass, Steph, they'd all be screwed.

And so many others, too.

If he could just convince Sionis he didn't know-

_Smack!_

Roy was thrown off his feet by a slap that scraped the thin, newly formed scab off his burned cheek and left it bleeding. He couldn't catch himself with his arm bound, probably couldn't have even if it hadn't been. The blow caught him by complete surprise. He fell on his side and had barely been there a second before Sionis grabbed him by the hair. Roy couldn't help the scream when he was pulled onto his knees, the fist twisting around his locks and tears pricking the corners of his eyes. Numerous strands were being torn out. 

" When I talk to you, you ginger bitch, you fucking answer!" Sionis ordered in a dangerous hiss of a voice, pulling Roy's head back and exposing the pale underside of his throat. Jason's hair wasn't long enough to get a good hold like he could with Harper and he might just get used to the additional handle. 

" Now who's the Bat?" 

Roy glared up at him best he could through his hazy, teary eyes and spat,

" I don't fucking know, so go. To. Hell."

" Not before I send your damn brat there." There was promise in his tone. 

" Don't you dare fucking touch her!" Roy remained alight with angry fire even in his vulnerable state of being and didn't hear Black Mask take off his belt. It was only when a dick was shoved into his mouth that he realised what was going on. Horror-stricken, Roy tried to pull away or bite him, only he couldn't with the steely hold keeping his head painfully in its place. He could only choke and splutter for breaths when Sionis drove himself further in.

" Can't fucking give me what I want - ngh - " Mask said in between rapidly fastening thrusts. " - might as well do something with that - mh - fucking mouth of yours-"

There was no lust or passion to the act, no desire other than to degrade Roy, only anger, and a show of dominance and ownership so great it scared him. At that moment, Roy caught a fleeting glimpse of why Jason feared the man. He thrashed and struggled, to no gain.

Roy had never realised how sensitive his gag reflex was. He was fighting for breath every second, his vocal muscles clenching to prevent the unwanted object going deeper down his throat, but it did nothing. His throat felt so fucking full, bursting at the seams. Every bit of resistance was punished by a hard yank of his hair.

" Just think, Harper," Sionis dragged Roy's head in closer, " my name's the one burned onto your fucking face. _I_ own you. And soon, when Jason is dead, I can spend all my time on you."

Roy managed to look up at him, trying to see why he predicted Jason's death. Seeing Mask's face so high above him was like the devil smiling down through a zippered mouth and facial covering that kept his features unchanging. 

" Jason dead, your brat dead, you'll be all mine. Just like Jason."

While his face was being fucked in, Roy screamed to any higher power that Oliver had gotten Lian far away from Star City to somewhere she would be safe.

Because soon Sionis would give the order to kill her and he could do nothing. He wished he could go back three minutes and give up Bruce's identity just to protect her because now even if he did, it was too late to appease Black Mask.

Tears flowed from his eyes and all he could think was that he'd made the wrong choice for his daughter.

* * *

 

" Thanks for the coffee, Ollie." Dick said, collecting the mugs and heading for the sink. He had taken the better part of an hour to finish the caffeinated brew, but that's the amount of time he and the Emerald Archer had spent discussing what their next move was. Oliver was going to take Lian out of Star City to be safe, but not before Dick caught himself one of Sionis's agents. Their target leaving so abruptly had the potential to spook them, and Dick might not get his hands on one if that was the case.

" No prob, kiddo." Oliver said as he rose and pushed the chair back beneath the kitchen table with a loud scrape against the stone tiled floor.

" It's nice to have company."

Dick seriously doubted a billionaire like Oliver was ever lacking for company, but he merely hummed in agreement as he rinsed the mugs out and put them into the dishwasher. When he closed the door and turned back to the table, he noticed Oliver had gone somewhere, quite soundlessly, too. 

Dick wagered he'd left to go check on Lian and followed his path into the living room. There he found the archer gathering a dozing little girl from the corner of the couch and into his arms. Lian must've fallen asleep during the add breaks in between episodes of her favourite show, as she wouldn't close her eyes even to blink when Paw Patrol was on. Oliver rested her head against his shoulder and Dick could see by the twitch of his goatee, that he was smiling. 

He wondered if he was thinking back to the days of Roy's childhood. 

" Remind you of someone?" Dick inquired with a knowing smirk. In so many ways, Lian was a lot like a baby Roy. Same hair, same smile, freckles, the whole kit and kaboodle. 

" Roy wasn't as cute as Lian." Oliver grinned, nuzzling Lian's ginger locks and planting a kiss there. " But yes. I'm gonna put up a fight when he comes back to pick her up."

Dick gave a small chuckle, appreciating the way Oliver didn't add an 'if' to the idea of Roy returning. 

" But I better get her off to bed." 

Dick didn't question why Lian was napping this early in the day. He nodded and stepped out of Oliver's way as he walked past with the child sleeping comfortably against his shoulder. Dick noticed a new stuffed animal was hanging loosely from her hand. It was a character from Paw Patrol, though he wasn't sure what its name was. It must've been a replacement Oliver got her, since he remembered seeing the one Jason bought her at Roy's apartment the night he went there.

Dick watched them go when a flash of something caught his eye. He looked out of the window to see what it was and from the roof of the next building over, he saw it again. Sunlight glinting off a small glass object on the roof. He knew what it was in split second.

" Ollie! Look out-"

_BANG!!_

Dick shoved Oliver and Lian out of the way and as he did, his back exploded into pain, the sniper's bullet hitting him square between the shoulder blades.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Aww, damn… do we believe Sionis that Jason chose to burn Roy's face? Or do we not? Let's make like the horrid vote of the late 80s (thumbs up if you understand) and let the viewers share their opinions.


	13. Chapter 13

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> After reading some fanfics with Black Mask in them, I realise my interpretation is the only one I've seen where he makes facial expressions and lemme explain….
> 
>  
> 
> I was imagining Sionis after the Under The Red Hood movie version, who has some capability to say, smirk, frown, glare, etc.

" Wake up, son." Sionis snapped his fingers twice, half an inch from Jason's face. Jason's thick, dark veils of lashes fluttered softly as the wings of a butterfly in response to his Sir's commands. The effort hurt to even imagine, but as Jason pushed his eyes open labourously, his vision lazily focussed on the bright white suit and black mask in front of him. It was all blurry for a few seconds. By the motion of his surroundings, Jason subconsciously reasoned they were in a car, or more likely, a limo.  
     
Once his boy was awake, barely though it may be, Sionis leaned back and settled against the cool leather covered backrest of his seat. Shifting one leg, he crossed it over his knee.

Jason thought he was swimming until things settled back down and his peripheral vision was no longer a rapid stretch of mixed up sights and neon colours.

He noticed Sir watching him and lowered his eyes automatically, so as to not accidentally meet his gaze. His throat bobbed as he swallowed, body less painful than he remembered it had been before he passed out. The muscles and tendons in his leg actually showed signs of response to the signals his brain sent them, though it wasn't entirely painless to move. He was stiff as a board and he couldn't help but wonder how long he had been out for.

And where were they going? Where was Roy? Jason couldn't see him in the car with them.

" Feeling better, Jason?" Sionis inquired. He wasn't asking because he cared to a particular extent, he was asking because he had one last mission in the field for his boy and being in moderately good health was necessary for what he was about to have Jason do.

Jason wasn't, really. He felt awful.

So he lied to appease Sionis. Lying was an enforced taboo he was willing to break if it meant he could fulfil his next orders and make Sir happy. 

" Y - ye - yes, s - s - sir." He really tried to keep from stammering when he said that, but his jaw wouldn't stop trembling. It was worse than normal, even if he wasn't cold or scared right now. Sionis scowled at him, he could feel it through the mask, and he knew he'd messed up.

" Fucking _bitch_. Haven't I told you not to speak to me like a fucking idiot?" He hissed, peeling off his sleek leather gloves by the fingers and folding them into his hand. " Remember what happens when you make yourself look like a stupid slut?" 

Jason swallowed again, this time very heavily. He did indeed remember. Last time he fucked up that badly, Sionis had made him hold boiling water in his mouth for a minute before he was allowed to spit it out, then he screwed his face to burst the blisters. His gob had been completely raw and sleek with blood and other fluids he cared not to name.

Jason had to apologise and not fuck it up.

" S - s-" _dammit_ , " sorry, s - sir. 'M sorry. _Sir_."

Sionis eyed him and his hopeless attempts at speaking. Without warning, he reached across the space that separated them and whipped Jason across the face with the gloves, effectively shutting him up. The crack of leather contacting skin was sharp and sudden and the blow was hard enough to snap Jason's head to the side. Before Jason could respond, not that he would have dared to, Sionis's hand was laid flat across his chest and shoving him back against the seat. 

Jason didn't protest to the crushing force that disallowed for his ribs to expand enough to breathe. He sucked in small intermittent inhalations through his teeth, terrified as he stared with wide eyes at the glittering brass buttons that held the front of Sionis's coat shut. The rasp of warm breath comings through the zippered mouth of the mask caressed his hair and his skin, and Jason expected to be hurt, he would have welcomed it in place of the intense, nerve-racking silence. Instead of raising a fist, however, Sionis released him and retreated some steps. 

" Now," Sionis said as he returned to his seat. He pulled the gloves back over his scarred hands to hide the pale white lines and crossed them over his lap. Jason settled back down with more ease now that Sir had resumed his place on the opposite side of the limo. 

He couldn't understand why he hadn't suffered worse than that but he was nothing, if not relieved.

" I want you to kill someone for me. Think you can do that, kiddo?"

Jason nodded once. 

" Yes, sir."

It would be an easy mission for once. Just a simple hit.

" And Jason,"

He looked up from the floor, Sionis's current, lighter tone one he had learned to associate with the allowance, or rather demand, of eye contact. 

" Yes, sir?"

" Subcon mode."

* * *

 

If Dick hadn't pulled civies over his kevlar padded uniform for sake of laziness, the bullet would have ended him. No question. But even with the armour, that shit expelled the air from his lungs and made him spit blood when he careered onto the ground. Though his chest was crushed by lack of breath, Dick hastily untangled himself from the mess of limbs he'd fallen in and rapidly glanced around the room for Ollie and Lian. There was broken glass everywhere and Lian had woken screaming in terror from her nap. Oliver had her and he grabbed Dick's wrist at the same time, far stronger than the younger man had imagined, and yanked him behind the cover of the couch as the sniper aimed another shot. It sunk into the floor where Dick had been, only seconds ago.

" It's Sionis." Dick breathed as Oliver all but shoved Lian into his arms. He closed them around her securely and held her shaking body against his own. She kept crying into his chest, fists clenched into tight little balls. Lian was scared beyond imagination.

The couch obscured their view as much as it did the hitman's, and they couldn't see where he was or if he was repositioning himself for a better aim.

" I know." Oliver grunted in response. Thrusting his arm beneath the couch, he withdrew it seconds later with his fingers curled around the middle of his spare bow, ten arrows unprofessionally attached around it with a piece of clear tape. 

" I'll get Lian to safety if-" Dick started and Oliver finished,

" - if I take out the sniper. Got it. _Go_." Oliver was already way ahead of Dick, notching an arrow and holding the rest between his teeth while he prepared to take aim. He counted to three in his head and sprung back to his feet, through the shattered window taking only a second to train his hawk's eye on the black shape against the sunlight, hunched over a gun on the opposite and considerably higher roof, where he had a perfect vantage point. Regardless of who had the upper hand, Oliver was a marksman without compare. He fired a trick arrow that exploded a white solidifying foam and showered the sniper with it, or at least it would have, if he hadn't ducked from view.

 _Where is he,_ Oliver kept mulling over in his head, _where is he?_

He scanned the rooftops across, gritting his teeth and a trickle of sweat leaving a wet trail down his temple. The bowstring was taut, the fletching tickling his cheek and the shaft in line with his vision.

An ever so slight flicker of movement gave away the hitman's position.

_There._

Dick waited for Oliver to have the sniper distracted before he made his move. He shot back up to his feet with Lian still crying in his arms, about to get her as far away from here as possible when he noticed the sniper or rather, what the sniper was wearing. He must've been over thirty yards away and still, Dick could make out the gleaming black helmet with a grainy white skull smudged over it.

Ollie wasn't using a trick arrow this time. The sharp jagged, edge of the lethal arrowhead glistened against the sunlight.

" Ollie, don' hurt him - it's Jason!" 

The brief hairsbreadth that Dick distracted Oliver for was one he came to regret because it was just what the sniper - _Jason_ , had been waiting for. Silenced by the muffler, a bullet tore through the air and thudded into Oliver's middle with a puff of fine red mist and a cry of pain.

Lian had stopped wailing long enough to witness him fall to the ground, blood spurting out of him.

 

* * *

 

Jason stared through rifle's eye even after he made the sluggish shot and floored the blond man. He was sputtering and gasping, eyes screwed shut tight and hands trembling over the bullet wound in a lame attempt to stop the blood. The other two, the tall ravenette and his target, weren't within his sights anymore, they'd dashed off to hide somewhere at the blond's ragged order, and Jason had a feeling he had to finish this one on foot. It was curious, however, that the archer was bleeding out and still wanted his target's safety above say, medical assistance. 

Jason stood and dropped the gun down on the roof. The metal clattered against the rough concrete noisily. Muffling a groan with his closed mouth, he held his swaying head in his hands and had to wait a second for the headrush to pass before he could pursue them, but even after it did, his sight continued to lazily swim and blur. On a normal day, all three would already be taken care of with quick and precise headshots, which proved to be impossible for him to do right now. 

Again Jason found himself wanting to know why Sionis had sent him on this mission, what with the malfunctioning that obviously affected his performance. 

But it wasn't his place to question why Sir made the decisions he did.

Jason grappled over to the broken window and burst into the torpedoed apartment, chunks of broken glass dyed red by blood crunching beneath the hard souls of his boots every time they contacted the floor. He walked - rather limped - across the room while he searched for them. They couldn't have gotten far.

He passed the blond man, who he had thought was dead by now, when a quivering hand reached out and wrapped around his ankle. The grip was weak, barely existent, and Jason could have kicked him off without the bit of effort. 

Instead, he allowed for his gaze to dart down and through his hood, meet the golden/blue eyes in the throes of silent agony. The light was visibly fleeing from him and turning him dull. 

" J... Jason-" he choked and coughed up a mouthful of foamy, bubble-ridden blood. It was richly oxygenated. Jason felt that he should know this man, he sure as heck seemed to know him, and his face was familiar, but... there was only the mission. Nothing else mattered. He yanked a jagged hunting knife from his holster and knelt, aligning it across Oliver's throat and pressed down on his rapid pulse. Oliver was gasping in too short breaths and shaking.

" Jason... th - that you, kid?" More coughing. Jason pushed the knife down harder, slicing through the first few layers of skin and unleashing a ribbon of blood to trail the blade. He glared darkly through the hood hiding his face, wanting so badly for this blond to just shut up and die already.

 _Do it,_ Sionis voice ordered in his head, _don't be a bitch, Jason. Do it!_

" D - don' hurt Li - Lian, J - Jay," Oliver rasped, redness gurgling past his lips and staining his goatee and the corners of his mouth. He swallowed heavily and closed his eyes for several beats before turning them back on Jason.

"... she - she's your daughter..."

" Get away from him, Jason!" The ravenette reappeared out of nowhere before Jason could even register what Oliver had said and kicked him in the side hard enough to throw him across the room, knife flying from his hand and landing somewhere out of his reach with a clatter. Jason stumbled but quickly found his footing, eyes darting in search of his target. 

Nothing.

" Jason!" Dick exclaimed and his little brother's head snapped towards him, faceplate hiding his expression, but his body language said it all.

Stiff, sluggish, unsteady, operating on a fraction of his normal capabilities.

Jason had come here hurt.

Dick hated to think it, but that was a good thing. He couldn't take Jason if he was firing at all cylinders and by the way he presented himself, he wasn't here with a white flag. Jason was cornered, face darting this way and that for a way out... or he was looking for Lian.

He glanced down at Oliver, rapidly bleeding out, and nervously licked his lips as he returned his gaze to Jason, praying he could resolve this with words, much as that seemed unlikely. He didn't want to hurt his brother when none of this was his fault, and he'd managed to get through to him that night at the apartment. Maybe it would work again.

" Jason, listen to me," Dick raised his hands in level with his shoulders, palms open and facing Jason. " I know you're scared, Little Wing, but it's me, remember? It's Dick. I'm not gonna hurt you." 

He could hear Jason's breathing intensify and see his chest expanding faster as Dick approached by one step, like he had last time. Did Jason think he was back in a hallucination? It was the only reason Dick could think that he wasn't answering to his name or recalling the measly progress he thought they had made.

And he was here to kill Lian.

" Talk to me, Jason." Dick insisted with a softer tone, though it was hard to keep his voice calm while Ollie choked on his own blood a foot away and Jason was trying to murder Roy's daughter. Now would be a fucking exemplary time for Bruce to receive the SOS he'd sent out and burst into the building.

Jason struggled, he really tried, to see through the haze of commands and respond to this person his brain so wanted to recognise. 

_'Subcon mode.'_

Right. Focus on the mission and nothing else.

Just then, the sound of a small foot pressing down on a loose, creaking floorboard snatched up his attention and Jason and Dick alike spun around to lock gazes with a set of large, frightened grey eyes. 

Dick's heart froze somewhere in his throat when Lian came out of the hiding place he'd left her in. For a moment, no one moved but Dick could feel Jason's gaze tracking every tiny flicker of movement from her like a predatory animal waiting to pounce upon its prey. 

Lian hugged her stuffed dog to her chest tighter and her lips trembled with the promise of more tears as she saw Oliver laying in a pool of blood, the scary skull masked man, and her uncle Dick looking so panicky. 

" U - uncle Dick?" Lian barely got the quivering, uncertain phrase out of her mouth before something, some invisible wire wound tight through the air, snapped and Jason lunged for her. Dick ran the instant he did, driving himself at Jason like a freight train and tackling him into a mess of struggling and flailing limbs on the ground.

" Run, monkey!" He yelled to the terrified girl, grappling with Jason in a headlock he was seconds from breaking. " Hide!" 

Dick didn't stay watching to see if she obeyed, but the pounding of feet vanishing down the hall told him she did. Jason threw his helmeted head back and struck Dick in the face with a staggeringly hard blow, erupting a volcano of pain and blood from his now surely broken nose. Jason did it again until the arms around him were forced to release and he leapt back up, bolting in the direction Lian had gone. 

Dick was after him before he could take three steps.

From the utility belt hidden beneath civilian attire, Dick snatched up the garrote vil and stretched the wire in his hands in preparation for jumping onto Jason's back and throwing it around his neck. Dick threw himself back, pulling the cable and crushing Jason's trachea with his whole body weight. A strangled cry wrenched free from his lungs as they both toppled down like the twin towers, Jason falling on top of Dick, which just so happened to be where Dick wanted him. Dick straddled his arms to his sides with his legs, linking his ankles to form a lock and although he could have made this easier for himself by continuing the use of the garrote, the faultlessly sharp wire was beginning to part Jason's skin and he threw the bloody thing aside, replacing it with his arm.

" Lil' Wing - listen to me!" Jason thrashed and Dick was barely holding him. He couldn't do it for long, he knew.

" Sionis wants you to hurt Lian! _Lian_ , Roy's daughter!"

" Sir _needs_ to get what he wants!" Jason screeched inhumanely in response, the first time he replied to anything Dick said to him, and that was only because it concerned Sionis's wishes.

" Listen to yourself, Ja - _argh!"_ A sharp pain exploded in Dick's side when the knife Jason whipped out of his boot went sailing in between the Kevlar pads, pinpointing the only weakness in his suit without flaw, and sank deep into his ribs. Jason shoved him off himself  the second he could and was running in pursuit of Lian again. 

Blood pooling around him and dizzy as fuck, Dick was gasping, his insides screaming while the fire spread through his veins and pulsated around the knife, its handle still sticking out of him. Pulling it out would make everything worse and he needed to get to Lian and protect her before Jason could kill her. Wincing heavily, he tried rolling onto his stomach and gathering his hands beneath him. 

" Argh!" The scream of pain turned into a whimper before it had even left his mouth. His vision was going double and the hallway was blotching, blurring, turning, spinning. He feebly, desperately, started to drag his bleeding, mess of a body down the hall, after Jason. He had to stop him from doing this terrible, wicked thing.

_Have to... get to Lian...._

_Fuck, Bruce. Where are you?_

_**Thud!** _

Dick hadn't even realised how far to the left he had been leaning before the world spun and he felt the floor against his face. 

He blacked out with an arm stretched in the direction Jason had gone, his last thoughts screaming out their names.

 

* * *

 

Jason had expected his target to scream in terror when he burst into the only room she could be hiding in, the penthouse's master bedroom, but nothing. He couldn't see her anywhere. The tinted glass covering the eyes of his hood made everything too dark to see clearly and he made the barely conscious decision to remove it. He lifted it from over his head, dishevelling his hair as he scanned the room. His fingers tried to dig into the metal of the helmet he was clutching so hard his knuckles were white beneath his gloves. 

Jason's tongue darted fleetingly across the chapped flesh of his lower lip, a cold sweat breaking out across his skin. That same old something was crawling, just under his skin. Small fragmented sparks of electricity darted through his muscles.

The words of those men he'd shot and stabbed raked across his brain distractingly when he needed to focus the mission.

_"... she - she's your daughter..."_

_" Sionis wants you to hurt Lian! Lian, Roy's daughter!"_

_**" SUBCON MODE."** _

He shook the thoughts away with a sharp twist of his head and checked beneath the bed, behind the door, in the bathroom,  all the conventional places, when his eyes landed on the walk-in wardrobe with the shutter doors. Without hesitation or half a thought, he threw them open and stepped into the dark interior, fancy dress suits and outfits almost as expensive as Sionis's dangling from hangers and lining the walls. Jason parted them with both hands, leaving no stone unturned between him and the end of the closet. 

He was getting close, he could feel it as he could hear the small, trembling breath coming from somewhere near him. A barely muffled and fearful whimper emanated from close by.

Jason slid the last knife he had on him out of its hiding place, the wrist holster beneath his sleeve, and prepared it in his fist for the kill.

_Crying._

He could now make out faint crying.

Jason listened, pinpointed where it was coming from, and thrust his arm through the veil of suits, fingers wrapping around the first thing they contacted and registered as animate. He dragged the girl out so roughly that his grip was the only thing keeping her on her feet.

Her crying turned to wails of terror.

Jason hauled her behind him and threw her tiny body across the room without effort and the bare minimum of mental registration. She hit the ground with a dull thwap that turned into more pathetic snivelling. She scraped her palms and her knees raw, leaving bloody red handprints on the lush white bedroom rug. 

Lian screamed and wept when Jason grabbed her by the hair and yanked her head back, about to run the blade clean across her throat and expose it to light when-

" JayJay, stoppit! You're - you're hurting  m - m - me!" Lian cried, tears forming sticky deltas down her flustered cheeks. She was shaking so hard, she was so scared. Her small hands were holding onto his arm, the one he held her head aloft with.

Jason froze when she spoke like an invisible force was grasping onto each of his limbs and stopping him from moving. 

" Y - you hurt un - uncle Oliver an - and uncle Di - Dick!" 

_**"Subcon mode."** _

He wrapped his fist around her hair tighter and pulled back more, gritting his teeth and demanding, fighting with himself to do as Sir wanted. It was all that mattered. This was just a mission, just a target. 

And still, someone or thing inside him was beating him, pummelling with both fists, to get away from her - the _target_... L - _Lian_. Lian was sobbing, shuddering, pleading in his rough hands while he had a knife to her.

Jason's heart stopped beating and his lungs were bursting with the breath he now was holding. 

 _He_ had a _knife_ to _Lian_. 

And he was about to - to - 

Gasping violently like someone had just hit him, Jason broke away from her and took retreating steps so fast he barely kept up with himself and came close to tripping. He backed right into the wall with a hard thud, causing a large abstract painting to fall and shatter, spilling long shards of glass across the floor already messed up with Lian's blood.

The blood he spilt.

Everything in his brain was going haywire again. Flashes, memories, orders, intentions, commands, lies, pain. It was all one big jumbled up nest of confusion. This was like the malfunctioning, only so much worse. 

In that brief dip into reality, the gravity of what he had done, what he had been about to do, bulldozed into him.

Jason had hurt his and Roy's baby girl.

Lian shook as hard as he must be shaking by now, still on the ground, trying to push herself up but her raw palms weren't doing their part. Every time the soft carpet brushed against the skinned underside of her hands, she cried louder.

" L - l - look wh- what you - you did-" She raised those ruined hands of her for him to see, cupping twin pools of crimson that dripped down steadily. Her big grey eyes were overflowing with an onslaught of tears and fear and pain. She was afraid, _terrified_ , of him and he had hurt her.

" Look what you did!" She wept harder as she repeated, turning her wrists to allow the blood to pour.

 

_" You were here before, and look what you did. Look what you did!" Lian reached into the rip that covered her stomach and started tearing out handfuls of intestines before Jason could stop her, all the while screeching, " Look what you did!"_

_A sudden burst of sounds and screams erupted from all around him and he was surrounded by thousands of tortured wails, each one crying out to him. He twisted around to see where they were coming from but every direction he faced, Lian was there, glaring at him while she tore her own organs out._

_" Look what you did, Jason!" A hand latched around his ankle and Jason glanced down in terror to see Roy pulling himself onto his broken legs with hands that grasped him mercilessly. Jason kicked him away before he could stop himself and stumbled back into the furthest corner._

**_" Look what you did! Look what you did! Look what you did! Look what you did!"_ **

 

Jason screamed, his surroundings warping and morphing until he was back in the nightmarish delusion. Lian shrieking at him, Roy mutilated, his family dead, and him, cornered. 

His fault. His fault. All his fault.

A litany of voices, all howling on top of one another, ploughed through his mind. He could make out eight different tones, hundreds of different statements and orders, thousands of words.

Too much - _too much!_

Jason was grasping at the wall, stumbling, trying to find a way out. His vision was blotching again, reducing him to the capability of a blind man. Lian was crying, crying so hard but he knew he had to get away from her before he did something awful, something he could never undo. 

Sir was screaming at him to go back and finish it.

When finally his heavy and drunken hands found the edge of the window, he wasn't sure what happened in between exiting the building and the moment he found himself running as hard as he could through the dingy Star City alleyways.  

 

**_" Look what you did! Look what you did! Look what you did! Look what you did!"_ **

 

Jason pressed his eyes shut tighter against the cacophony exploding and vibrating in his skull, not even aware of how his leg begged him to stop or how blackness swirled in a blotchy, inky mass whether his eyes were open or shut. 

" I'm sorry," he cried when he finally collapsed in an alley behind a Chinese takeout, curling around his knees and seeing all the terrible, wicked things he had done to the people he thinks he cared about. 

" I'm sorry." He repeated, though he didn't know who he was apologising to. Jason hugged himself tighter, shuddering. Rain was falling heavily from the dark grey mantles looming overhead, soaking him and making the shivering worse.

Was it worse that he had hurt them or that he had failed the mission? He was going to have to face Sir with news of this failure and there would be agonising repercussions.

But he hadn't killed Lian.

But he had hurt her.

And Dick.

And Oliver.

Or had he killed them both?

It was a haze, a blur, or had that all been a delusion, too? 

Jason didn't even know what was real anymore, only that there was someone who he had failed somewhere and he would suffer for it.

" I'm sorry." He whimpered one last time before he lost track of everything.

* * *

 

The Dark Knight had gone through every one of Black Mask's HQs in Gotham, uprooted everything, in the search for Jason and now his sweetheart, Roy.

Batman was getting close. Too close. Sionis was playing this an inch from the chest and that meant in order to win, it was time for some drastic measures.  The hard blow beneath the Bat's belt before he had time to deliver one of his own. That one thing that could tip the scales. The major advantage in his possession.

In a word, Jason Todd.

Or rather, what the boy knew.

Harper wouldn't give him what he'd demanded, and he would suffer for it, but he still needed the Bat's identity and unfortunately, when Pyg had remoulded the kid's brain to forget who Batman was to him, he _forgot_ who Batman was. Sionis knew he needed the name to solidify his win for good and even if that meant by some means undoing some of the conditioning for the information he needed, so be it. 

It would be a different matter altogether if Jason's body wasn't failing him, restoring him then to his own mind would make him extremely dangerous. But now? The worst he could do was curse at them.

And Sionis seriously doubted the restoration would fully work. There was bound to be a number of traumas that would remain and trigger words Jason would still respond to. All Sionis wanted was Batman's name, after all, the rest of his boy's head could remain a scrambled junkyard for all he cared.

However, until Sionis could figure out how he was going to get into Jason's brain for the forgotten knowledge, he was going to have to do something else to keep the Knight at bay. His minions could wage war on him, yes, but that wasn't the smartest thing he could do. Why waste his own resources and firepower when he could get all of Gotham's underbelly to do his bidding for him? 

With Harper in the capable hands of Doctor Hughes and Jason returned in disgrace from a failed mission, Sionis had set up a meeting at one of his drug warehouses with the people who wanted Batman dead more than anyone, the fundamentalist hate-Batman-club, the rogues gallery. 

They would land a series of hard, crippling blows. They just needed a wee bit of encouragement in the idea that any Bat could be broken.

Jason needed punishing for failing anyway, so this was two birds with one stone. Or two bats. 

" I hope you brought refreshments, folks," Sionis said into the microphone, gazing through the gloom at a crowd of villains who were wondering why they were here. The promise and sense of premature victory in his voice was amped up by the ambience the dark building provided. There were murmurs of question from the sea of faces.

" Because you're in for quite a show." 

At his sign, a blinding floodlight boomed down from the ceiling and gave everyone a clear view of the unmoving form hanging by the arms on the centre of the stage. A chain wrapped around both wrists held him suspended a foot from the ground, the weight of his body beginning to pull his shoulders apart from him.

The rogues gallery didn't take a second to identify the red helmet and bat sprawled across his crest and the room went up in cheers and hoots and demands for blood. Red Hood had screwed them all  over and they knew, they were sure, that they were in for some fun in the form of revenge.

" Gut the fucking brat!" Someone screamed, getting an uproar of agreements and _yeahs._ People were throwing their fists in the air and stirring up quite the commotion, exactly what Black Mask had been hoping for. Their surroundings went up in explosions of sounds and villains wailing to get their hands on and around him. Around Jason.

" We wanna see his insides, Mask!"

" Bring the bitch to me, I got a score to settle with his ass!"

" My brother's dead cause o' him!"

_" BLOOD!"_

" _Blood! Blood! Blood!"_ The chant grew louder and louder till it shook the warehouse's very foundations. Everyone was screaming that one thing it seemed.

" Be patient." Sionis insisted, smiling devilishly behind the safety of his mask. From beside him, he could hear Jason's breath quicken and his body behind to shake with small trembles. He almost lifted his head enough to stare at the tens of Batman's worst enemies who thirsted for blood. _His_ blood.

" We've got all night."

 


	14. Chapter 14

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> " The Red Hood has rubbed us all the wrong way," Black Mask stated in a loud voice he reserved for announcements and speeches. Even before he had properly gotten into what he had to say, he could feel he had the complete and undivided attention of every pair of eyes in the room.
> 
> " and for that, he needs to be punished!"

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Eh… sorry, Nance. I pretty much ripped of those ideas you sent me word for word….. I hope a vivid torture sesh will make up for my shameless plagiarism. The rest of you normal people out there, get ready for some sickening shit.
> 
> I'm not kidding. Beware.

" The Red Hood has rubbed us all the wrong way," Black Mask stated in the loud voice he reserved for announcements and speeches. Even before he had properly gotten into what he had to say, he could tell he had the complete and undivided attention of every pair of eyes in the room.           
     
" and for that, he needs to be punished!"

" Yeah!" The rogues roared in agreement, throwing clenched fists and profanities regarding the Hood into the air.

" But our war isn't with him," with a sweep of his hand, Mask gestured to Jason for emphasis, " he's just a bitchy little underling, working under our real enemy - Batman!"

" Fuck the Bat!" The unmistakable voice going with a half-burned off face yelled above all the other ruckus.  " We need to take this city back!"

" I'm with Two-Face!" Riddler chimed in, getting a cacophony of like-minded responses too many to count. Sionis waited for their rowdy, revenge-filled buzz to die down a fraction before he continued.

" We gotta turn Gotham on the Batman to win - not just us villains, but _Gotham_. They see him as their saintly saviour in black, but what would the good people of our city have to say about a man who turns children into soldiers and sets them free on the most dangerous streets in the world?"

By the way the uproar died down to murmurs, Sionis could tell what he had hoped was clear as the day had gone over their heads. Dumb idiots. Looks like he had to explain, word for word. Walk them through the obvious, as he was used to doing with individuals of their low intelligence. Thank fuck he needed their firepower and not their brain cells.

He signalled to a minion or lackey of his, obediently waiting out of sight on the edge of the stage. At seeing his boss's hand sign, he scuttled over too fast to be a respective pace, holding the strap of a duffel bag wrapped twice around his wrist. It was heavy with metallic clinks sounding every step he took that jolted it. He handed it over and Mask accepted it, putting it down and unzipping it. The audience couldn't see what was in it, but from his lofty vantage point, Jason sure as hell could.

The chain links keeping him aloft were clinking their surfaces together when he began to shake more.

Knives, a power drill, pliers, bolt cutters, an awl, a hammer, and syringes. Lots of syringes filled with neon liquids of different shades. Each tool was glistening with the promise of opening his veins.

But what really made him scared? Made his breath shudder and his eyes widen behind his hood?

The rusty old crowbar sitting on top of it all, taunting him with its brownish-red surface and subtly curved ends. It was the one Roy used on him, looked like the one that's shape Joker had beaten into him.

Was he really going to be beaten with one of those awful things three times in his life? In a warehouse, no less?

Jason had really screwed this Murphy fellow over badly to constantly be on the receiving end of his law.

Sionis straightened soon, feeling everyone's gazes tracking his movements when his hand returned from the bag with the crowbar.

It was like the moment in a movie when you know there'll be a plot twist or jump scare. Everyone knows what's going to happen but they're still tensing up to the moment when it will. 

He walked up to Jason and tapped him on his temple twice with the cast iron tool, metal on metal giving a double clank, one after the other. Sionis could feel the boy's pulse quicken. 

Jason's heart stumbled hard in his ears, blocking out all other sounds except the breath that was raggedly moving in and out of his mouth at regular, gasping intervals. He found he was staring at the ground he wasn't quite touching instead of Mask and the weapon waved in front of his face. He could no longer control his hands, much less any of his limbs; they were shaking in an odd trembling rhythm as the colour drained from his face. 

He was in for a world of pain and he knew it.

Like he was presenting a business idea, posture to match, Sionis turned back to the rogues and their wide wondering eyes, but kept the crowbar side-by-side with his boy.

" Red Hood is my bitch," he announced, " and by that, I do mean quite literally. He's sucked me off more times than I remember."

They laughed at that, some just chucking but others full of cackling at a notion so preposterous, yet here was the evidence before them, in the form of the Hood, quivering in terror and his life in Black Mask's hands. 

" But before he did his work under me, he used to belong to someone else," Black Mask ran the clawed end of the crowbar along the side of Jason's helmet and down the curve of his jaw, resting it lightly on his jugular. 

" Who did you belong to, son? Tell these nice people." As he spoke, he pushed Jason's head up with the tool, forcing him to face the sea of spectators, whose relentless eyes and twisted grins lusted for his suffering. 

Jason swallowed heavily and tried to keep the irregularities from his voice when he knew he had no choice but to answer.

" Y - y - you, s - sir." 

Again, everyone was laughing only this time, at his inability to speak. 

For once, Sionis wasn't pissed off by his stammering. If anything, he seemed to relish it and find enjoyment in the way it further made the rogues see his point. If he could get the feared gang lord Red Hood to cower like a beaten dog, nothing was beyond his grasp of capabilities.

" Of course, good answer, kiddo, but let me rephrase that." Sionis moved the crowbar away to search the back of Jason's helmet with his free hand until he found the lock that held it in place. He released it with a hiss from the air cache and delicately removed the hood from over Jason's head, giving one and all a visual drag of his face, fine features, pretty eyes, and ruffled onyx hair making them catcall and whistle and shout out perverted remarks.

" _Damn!_ That bitch fine as hell!"

Sionis ignored that one and continued to talk to Jason like they were the only people there.

" Who did you used to belong to? Who was your daddy before me?"

Jason pinched his lower lip between his teeth, trying to remember the answer.

_Belong to?_

He fuzzily recalled a life before the white room and Pyg, but it was a memory far detached. Like a book he'd read or movie he once watched, not his own experiences but memories nonetheless.

" B - Batman?" He finally replied though it was more of a question than knowledge based on fact. 

Their surroundings fell silent with the name of their shared enemy, every villain now listening with peeled ears and intent. Finally, this story was progressing to a point where it interested them.

The tone Sionis used next was one Jason had heard often and had learned to associate with him grinning behind the mask, like every time he knew he was winning.

" My goodness," Sionis gave a small, feigned gasp, as if he didn't already know all the answers to his questions. " How on earth did that happen?"

" Wa... was Ro - Robin, s - sir." 

At least, Jason thinks he was Robin. He remembered being Robin, but at this point, he no longer knew what was real and what had been a drug and trauma-induced delusion. Until recently, he had thought Roy and Lian were dead and that had all been a lie too. There was no truth he trusted at this point in time.

" How old were you when Batman recruited you?"

" F - fourteen, sir."

" And which Robin were you? Second? Third?"

Dick Grayson was the first, Jason recalled, Tim Drake was the third, and he'd been in the middle. He supposed that made him Grayson's successor. Robin mark 2.

" Second, sir."

" And we all know what happened then. Batman's precious baby bird got offed by that repulsive clown."

" He don' look dead to me." Two-Face dryly observed while he rolled his cigar between his lips with his tongue.

" You see, my dear Harvey," Sionis began to explain with far more patience than was his nature.

"Hood fucked up once when I had 'im drugged up. He let it slip that Talia al Ghul, of all people, revived him with a Lazarus Pit in a desperate attempt to get into the Bat's pants."

Laughter. There was laughter after that, mixed with chatter if it could be true or not.

" That's some story," the attention of each soul there, Sionis and Jason included, shifted to the new voice. A small round man with a cane and long crooked nose lumbered up the stairs leading to the stage. A top hat sat tall on his mop of long, stringy salt-and-pepper hair. Through the monocle resting against his left eye, he stared at Sionis with his beady black eyes.

" But does the kid have any proof?"

Oswalt Cobblepot, always the damn sceptic. Sionis almost cursed aloud and though he held back on that, he certainly did it in his head. Fucking Penguin, even in the face of Gotham's underbelly's greatest win where they should act as allies, he still had to play the equal rival to Black Mask. Equals? Pfft. They weren't in the same game, much less the same level.

The rogues murmured in agreement that proof was necessary and Sionis turned back to Jason. 

" Proof, son?"

Jason stayed mute, staring at the ground below him. It was visible in his eyes that his mind had trailed off somewhere, until Mask hit the chain hanging taut above his head with the crowbar, effectively snapping him out of the tranced state he had fallen into. The sound terrified him more than it should have. His eyes darted left and right, trying to see something that wasn't there.

Sionis could hear Penguin snicker under his breath as he leaned forward with both hands on his cane, happy to see Jason drawing a blank when it came to actual evidence for Mask's claims. 

It pissed Sionis off and he pressed harder.

" _Proof_ , _Jason."_

Behind them, a soft gasp and eyebrows were raised. The villains hadn't imagined Black Mask knew Red Hood to such a personal extent that he would be addressing him by first name, despite what he had thus far claimed. Maybe the use of 'Jason' was to prove some point they weren't aware of.

" ... I... uh.." Jason was grasping for words. He shouldn't tell, some part of him was hell-bent in the belief that everything would go south if he said anything. He should just bite his tongue and keep his mouth shut.

It's what Br... The other Sir would want.

" _Jason_." Mask's voice had reverted back to that hostile, threatening hiss. He was going to hurt Jason very soon if he didn't comply.

" Obey."

The crowbar hit the chain again, this time hard enough to make him jolt and Jason whimpered. He had to now, he didn't want to get hurt or disobey Sir.

"  B - Batman has a - a hidden vehicle entrance... In - in Robinson Park. Goes t - to his b - ba-" 

_No, Jason, don't say it. Don't tell them it goes to the Cave!_

" - Bowery, sir. It leads to the Bowery." He finished with a deep exhalation. That had felt like a lot more work than it actually was. 

Sneer fading, Penguin stiffened when something close to evidence revealed itself and Mask's smirk remained hidden. The bastard wasn't so smart-mouthed now.

" Hidden vehicle entrances, you say, boy?" Sionis continued, pressing the crowbar against Jason's larynx and making him swallow hard and difficult against it. 

" How many?"

Jason shuddered. 

" I - I don't know, s - sir." And that was the honest truth. Jason didn't know.

" Is that so?" He didn't take Jason for his word and signalled back to his minion, still standing by the outskirts of the stage. He immediately went for the half-forgotten duffle bag strewn open on the ground, sifting through it. This seemed rehearsed, pre-planned. But that wasn't surprising if it was true, Sionis planned years ahead.

The man produced the power-drill, holding it out for Sionis to take, except he didn't just yet.

" Ple - please, sir. I - I don't know." Jason tried, growing slightly frantic in the face of what he knew was just around the corner. Pain. White-hot agony.

" I don't believe you, son." Sionis dropped the crowbar with a loud clang and took the drill in its place, pulling down on the trigger. The sharp, maliciously twisting bit whirred to life and spun. It came closer to Jason, the head pressing into his shoulder just enough to wear away his suit.

" No! No, please, sir, I don't know!" Jason was tearing up by now, terrified and tearing up. He didn't care that the rogues were roaring their heads off with laughter, he just didn't want to get hurt again.

Jason twisted his body and thrashed against the chain, getting nowhere. He could already predict how the sharp metal bit would feel when it drilled into his body. Pain exploding, muscles shredded, blood gushing, bone tunnelled into. 

God he could feel it, taste is, _see_ it.

The drill was pushed harder, tip penetrating the suit, but it did nought but graze his skin before Sionis it pulled back. He didn't put it away, though, instead kept it ready in his hand.

" Alright, then, kiddo, I believe you. But that won't do, tell us something else. Something only a Robin would know."

Jason was more willing this time around.

" Uh, th - there's a we - weapons stash b - by the docks in a  - a hidden bunker dis - _guised_ as a shi - shipping container."

 _"Ooh_ ," the crowd went.

" Sionis, I gotta question for the kid." Two-Face stepped on stage, not remaining on the outskirts like Penguin but walking right past him and coming to stand a few steps from Mask and Jason. His shoulders were broad, almost as much if not as broad as Batman's, and he was an impressive 6'3 in height. His body mass was quite substantial, thick and sturdy, capable of far more than he ever put effort towards. One side of his face, healthy golden tan framed by soft sunshine hair, was fixed on Sionis while the other and the considerably less flattering side was discoloured, twisted knots of disfigured flesh dusted with decay. The eye in that too dark socket wasn't acting in unison with the other, instead staring off past Mask's shoulder.

If Roman Sionis was a man who could be intimidated, Harvey Dent might be the one to do it.

" Go ahead, Harvey." Sionis gestured to Jason in a 'be my guest' sort of way, marking him as open for discussion.

Dent's face twisted into something like a sneer, growing wider with every step he advanced that made Jason shake more. His chest was rising and falling rapidly, eyes trained hard and wide on the ground.

Dent snatched his face in his big calloused hand, turning it against Jason's will so they could look at each other. Being suspended actually aligned their gazes, not that Jason would meet his.

A tiny whimper, too soft to carry far, slipped past his lips.

" I got no quarrel with you, Hood. With Batman, yes, but not you." Dent began, misleading Jason with his intentions and leading him into a place of small false hope. If he personally had nothing against Red Hood, maybe Jason wouldn't be hurt so bad?

" But with Robin? Oh yes. You say you're the second one, right? Well, that little punk cost me four million dollars and eight years in Blackgate."

The crowds grew more intent, some snickering expectantly. It was clear where this was going and where it would end. Hint, it was with Jason having a few more scars to count.

" Beat me up, too, nice and bloody. Said I killed his daddy or somethin'. But of course, I don't remember some random lowlife I had snuffed. So my question for you, Jason," he pushed the point of his thumb into Jason's cheek, making out the sharp points of his teeth the further he went. Jason winced, jaws being forced to part.

" Is did I kill your sperm donor?"

Jason didn't reply but he did think that was true. That Two-Face had murdered the man responsible for his conception. It didn't matter now, though. He swallowed visibly and lowered his head, pretty much confirming the story without meaning to.

" Thought so." Dent smirked. The rogues started to shout words of approval to him.

But Dent wasn't done, not by any means. He stroked Jason's cheek, hand trailing down the crook of his neck and then to the red bat on his chest, where it lingered a while before continuing its descent. Fingers swept over his abs and studied the flat of his stomach and curve of his hip.

" You were a weird lookin' kid but my god, you certainly grew up to be pretty." Dent thoughtfully murmured to himself.

Excessively uncomfortable, Jason wanted to kick him away, make him stop feeling him, but the glower Sir gave him warned him not to. Jason had always thought he was exclusive to Sionis, just his to fuck, so why was he allowing this?

When Dent's hand finally landed on Jason's thigh, he gave it a hard squeeze, studying the muscle structure with a disgusting smile and eyes burning with lust. 

" Damn.... Bet you could kill with these, boy." With that, he got his hands off Jason and turned back around to face Sionis, still grinning with sick intent that Jason knew he should be afraid of.

" You've got my entire support, Mask, men and firepower alike. _But_ ," there was a pause, one that added emphasis to his terms to come. " I want to get my cock in the kid. I never did get him back for ruining my operations back in his pixie boot days."

" I see," Sionis had known what he was going to want in return before he even said it. He had been able to tell just by the glimmer in his smile when he got a close look at his boy. Any retard with eyes in their head would want Jason to themselves. He had Harper now, he didn't need Jason for anything but gaining allies. 

" Well, the message here is that any Bat can be beaten." Sionis said, hands behind his back. Jason's heart was sinking further and further into the depths of his stomach the more Sir spoke. He was going to loan him out to Dent, wasn't he? The thought made his head swim with repulsion. _Harvey Dent._

" And that we need to get Batman back." Riddler added from the crowd of faces, his hideous green and plum outfit making it impossible not to recognise him, even when he was surrounded by tens of villains with grudges. 

" Precisely," Mask agreed, nodding. Finally, they were getting the idea of this meeting. " And for each of your alliances, do whatever you want to the kid." He swept his hand towards a rapidly hyperventilating Jason. 

" YEAH!!" They hollered heartily, laughing and clapping. Their enthusiasm was heartwarming, really.

" Except kill him." Sionis added and the cheers died down a notch, but still, they remained hyped to take their grudges against the Bat and the Hood alike, out on Jason. There were tens of them, many Jason recognised but also some he didn't, and he was sure he couldn't take all the pain they had in store for him.

He gave Sir one last pleading look before Sionis gestured to the lackey and the chain unwound. Jason fell like a sack of sand but didn't quite land on the ground, which he would have much preferred to slumping into Dent's waiting arms. Jason tried struggling to get away, pushing both hands into his chest and make space between them, but Dent was stronger than him now that he was injured, malnourished, and a number of other things.

More laughing at his useless attempts. 

" N - no. Get - get off me." Jason wanted to make his voice unwavering, but it came out as a quivering plead. He was lowered onto his back with so little effort it was like he was just laying there and taking it, not trying so hard to get away. Even as Dent pinned his hands above his head with just one of his own, fingers curling around his wrists, he couldn't do a damn thing to stop it.

" Not on your life, bitch. When you see your daddy again, tell him this is what he gets for fucking with Two-Face!" 

And then he kissed the boy beneath him harshly, while Jason stayed frozen in his grasp. It was a couple seconds before Jason got to comprehending it, which is when he started to thrash again but it was no use. _Again_. Dent crushed him, crushed his body as if he were still a little hundred pound Robin.

" Hahaha!" The rogues were screeched in a myriad of entangled voices. 

" Fuck the slut raw, Two-Face!"

Sionis smiled lightly at how excited for his cause they suddenly were. This was going well. He returned his hidden eyes to Dent, who was reaping the full pleasures out of revenge on the ex-Robin. If there was one thing that could be said about Harvey Dent, it's that he never forgot the bad blood. And by the way he bit down on Jason's lip and tore at it with his teeth, that was obvious.

" Mmh, fuck!" With a gasp of pain from Jason, Dent he ripped away a piece of flesh from his mouth, blood now on both of them. He spat it aside, looking like Satan himself with the way he beamed above the shuddering, crying body.

" You taste so good, little bird." He craned his neck and lapped up the dribble of red down Jason's face with an eager tongue, raising some brows in the room. Bloodplay was a fetish many wouldn't have pegged Gotham's former white knight to have. 

Jason was gasping deep like a fish on dry land, crying out each time teeth pinched his skin between them and left garish red bite marks. Dent was biting a steady trail through his clothes and down his body, taking particular care to torture his neck. Jason could still taste the faint dusting of decay in his mouth, left behind by the kiss he hadn't wanted. He didn't want any of this.  He couldn't even hear himself begging the man to stop anymore, even when he kept repeating it again and again. The room was deaf to his pleads.

Dent's jaws closed around Jason's rapidly pulsating jugular so hard that for a moment he feared he planned to rip it out. 

" Stop teasing, Dent!" A rowdy and near definitely horny villain yelled out, hungry for more than a little bloodplay and lip-locking. They no doubt had their hands down their pants right now.

Dent grinned and pulled away from Jason, though still holding him down with his entire body weight.

" Gotta give them what they want, Robin." It was disturbing the way he preferred to use the alias Jason had flown under as a child, instead of the one he adopted later on in life.

Dent was picturing the bright yellow cape, green/red colour scheme, and boyish grin on Robin's face when he flipped Jason onto his stomach, flipped him like his weight was nothing.

Jason tried to pull his arms beneath himself and Dent didn't bother trying to stop him from getting away, too busy pulling his belt off. He grabbed Jason by the hair and yanked him back beneath him with a whine of pain when he was done. 

 _" No. No,_ don't _."_  Jason whispered, indignant, when his clothes started coming off. First Dent grappled with his holsters and belt, starting on everything else when he removed it. There was barely an inch of Jason's skin not bearing a scar and somehow Dent found arousal in that. 

" There you go, kiddo." Dent murmured, lining himself just right while his fingers sank into Jason's hips. 

" N - no, _please_." Jason was gasping as he pleaded in preperation for the inevitable.

" Shh. Stay nice and quiet for your uncle Two-Face and I promise you'll like it." And then with that promise he bucked his pelvis and he drove himself in, too hard and too rough.

The spectators were hooting like wild animals with the first thrust that turned to many, steadily fastening. Jason yelped or whined jolt after jolt, pain and the knowledge coursing through him in torrents, that the man who killed his father was now fucking him with a live audience consisting of Batman's worst enemies.

This was different from when Sir did it. Jason knew he belonged to him without question, so this felt like the utmost betrayal. He was betraying Sir without being able to stop it.

It was on his hands and knees that Jason finally noticed the object on the far end of the stage. A camera on a tripod and the red 'on' dot was blinking. And who knew how long it had been there.

They were filming this.

Why the hell were they filming this?

The lump in his throat expanded and he shut his eyes tight against the tears. They left stars to glitter on his lashes.

From on top of him he could only hear Dent grunting from the effort of fastening his pace.

" Oh fuck! Shoulda done this years ago." He went. The next thrust was hard enough to make Jason _scream_ and grapple the smooth surface of the ground for anything to pull himself away with. Even if he'd found something it would have been no good, Dent adjusted himself so that his knees were pinning Jason's legs against the floor, rendering him inept of escape.

" Pl - please - get off - m - me-" Jason cried, his insides squashed and wailing in pain. He couldn't stop the shudders that wracked him almost as much as Dent pulling close to all the way out of him, only to slam right back in with a vengeance.

" Mmh," Dent licked his discoloured lips, " keep begging - ngh - baby bird. I like - _that_."

Sionis watched the barbarians going crazy over this and once again felt superior in all aspects. Idiots the lot of them, but if this is what it took to gain their loyalty, so be it. In the long run, it was a small fee to pay.

Riddler joined them on the stage without bothering to inquire if it was allowed and Sionis didn't bother saying anything, just continued to observe the question-mark clad man come to stand over Jason, spinning his cane humming through the air. He pressed one rough soled shoe on Jason's hand and turned it, cutting into his skin and grinding him into the ground. Again, Jason's scream turned into a whimper.

" Remember shooting me in the leg, Jasey? Remember that?" Grinning, Nygma flicked a switch on the handle of his cane, a small blade shooting out of the lower end of it. It looked blunt as hell.

Jason glanced up at him with teary eyes, Dent's fingernails burrowed deep into his hips as he was undeterred by Nygma's presence.

" Well, this is payback." Nygma plunged the cane down, right into Jason's hand. The blade, though dull as it was, became buried in the third knuckle of his index finger. His _trigger_ finger. Jason shrieked, voice raw. He thrashed but could get nowhere with Two-Face holding him in place. 

Grin broadening, Riddler twisted the cane in his fist and a sickening snap and then pop from the socket loudly told everyone there that he was detaching Jason's finger from his hand. Dent even paused long enough to watch Jason screaming and screaming, blood spurting from his knuckle when Nygma finally cut through the skin and tendons, pulling the finger away with a drag of the blade.

The crowd went insane.

" YEAAAHHHH!!!!!!!" 

Nygma beamed from sadistic pleasure, gaining the immediate approval from every villain in the room. Except for Sionis, of course. He kind of just stood there, watched, and no one could tell what he was thinking behind the gimp mask.

Uncaring, Dent continued to fuck him after that, while Jason stared in horror and agony at his ruined hand, large teardrops descending from his eyes mixing with the blood and forming an unpleasant stew. The amputated digit sat a few feet away on the end of a red trail, just staring at him like it had eyes and a face.

The unimaginable pain made Jason's head swim but he still registered Nygma going for his other hand. He tried to slap him away or somehow move, which was no more successful than ever.

" Nono... please d - _don't_." Jason whimpered but saw no mercy on Nygma's rodent-like features. He smirked, crushing Jason's hand into the concrete with his heel. This time he didn't go for the quick and slightly less painful blade in the cane, instead he took Jason's index and started twisting it back into an agonising contortion, until it snapped with a loud _crack_. The sensation of the bone splintering to fragments beneath his skin and giving way was tortured Jason almost as much as the pain. He was sobbing by now, so hard it wracked and quaked his body. There were so many times bile clogged his throat and he almost threw up. 

There was a wet popping sound, a _squelch_ , when the finger was pulled from its socket and Jason could only give a weak, teary moan and shudder, clenching his other and equally destroyed fist in preparation for _it_. He tried to harden himself to Nygma slicing through the skin pulling, twisting the last strips of sinews and ligaments and ultimately removing the finger, but he couldn't. Ragged, harsh, the scream that tore from his lungs had nothing humane to it, nor did the rounds of cackling that broke out.

Nygma picked up the mutilated fingers and held them high in both hands for all to see. They were cheering wildly. Applauding, whistling, whooping.

" Bitch won't be firing those guns anymore!" He tossed the severed digits into the crowd and Jason didn't want to look and see what they would do with them. His hands burned, tears stung his eyes, but he kept them shut, taking the last of Dent in him, before he finally pulled away, leaving blood and white strings of cum dripping down Jason's legs. The pressure was released from around his hips and Dent gave a content, breathy sigh, pulling his pants back on.

" Next time your daddy or you wanna fuck with me, remember whose cum you're full of." And then a chuckle from him. " Do this again some time, kid?" He sneered but stopped when Sionis finally stepped into the picture. Jason shuddered and shifted his bloody hands on the floor, head inclined so as to not look up at Sir.

" Enough, Harvey. Let's give everyone their turn. Jason," he jerked his head towards his boy on the ground. " Get dressed, you gotta a lotta eager beavers waiting to get their time with you."

Nygma and Dent departed, re-joining the crowd and Jason shakily stood, doing his very best to pull his clothes back on with his bleeding, aching, and far less functional hands. Each time the fabric brushed against the remnants of his knuckles he wanted to cry. Strings of sticky white substances stained the insides of his thighs, but he managed to hide it when he finally got his jeans on. 

The next person was Penguin, and he went straight for Jason's mouth.

 _Thrust, thrust, thrust_. No heed to the choking or tears in Jason's eyes as blood began to take up residence beneath his tongue.

Before long, Jason found himself choking on a pump of cum that filled his cheeks and his stomach when he was made to swallow.

He almost puked when the thick salty-sweet liquid went down.

He got a few hits and whacks from Cobblepot, but it ended after that on his part. For some reason, he wasn't quite as rough as many of the others who came after that.

 

Fifteen or maybe twenty villains in and Jason was losing focus, swimming in a sea of pain and near oblivion. They each had their own customized torture methods, made just for him.

Victor Zsasz was particularly bad. He left Jason with the ugly word **'WHORE'** carved in big capital letters on his back, stretching and filling up the entire space between his shoulder blades. 

And Sionis hadn't said a thing. Nothing. No word of warning to even those who clearly got too carried away and left Jason laying in a crumbled, whimpering mess in a pool of his own blood, his shallow breath coming in small wheezes. There was no need to restrain him, anymore. He couldn't move if he wanted to. Muscles torn and bones broken in too many places. He was cut up like a line of coke.

Could the Lazarus Pit's rejuvenating side effects fix this extent of damage? Sionis didn't know nor did he really care. All he needed was his boy alive for now, not in prime physical condition.

They were almost done taking turns when the doors burst open and slammed into the walls, _twice_. Every head snapped in that direction, scared for seconds that it was the Bat.

No such luck for poor little Jason.

Against the streetlights dull shine, the silhouettes of two people stood for seconds before the taller one stormed in, ranting and raving with exaggerated waves of his arms.

" What the hell is this?!" He shrieked shrilly, painted red lips curled back to reveal his teeth and his brow scrunched up into a deadly glare without comparison. Like the red sea before Moses, the crowds parted to let the Clown Prince of Crime through, Harley bouncing behind merrily with her hammer over her shoulder. 

Again, Sionis found himself mentally cursing. He'd deliberately not invited those two chaos obsessed maniacs when he was trying to create order among the rogues gallery. How the fuck had they found out?

" First you throw this big secret shindig without inviting me-!"

Joker leapt onto the stage, marching up to Sionis and staring him down with a burning glower, despite being slightly shorter than the other. Sionis didn't flinch, didn't back away. He pressed his hand into Joker's chest and pushed him back a foot or so, making the space between them reasonable.

Joker continued going off the rails, gesturing to the broken mess of the former Robin on the floor with un-coordinated swings of his hands. His eyes were big, pupils small, nostrils flared and chest heaving with heavy breaths. Sionis had never seen anyone look to deranged.

Still, he wasn't intimidated by a grown man masquerading as children's birthday party entertainment. 

" Then you - you-" He couldn't finish, finding no words during his childish meltdown. Sionis waited for him to calm down a bit and resume breathing at a normal, non-hyperventilating pace. Harley curled her arm around Joker's and sympathetically stroked his back to encourage steady intakes of air.

" It's okay, puddin'." She soothed in her strong Jersey accent, cherry red lip gloss glistening under the boom of the floodlights.

" Why are you here, Joker?" Sionis demanded in a less than patient tone. Arms behind his back, he was digging his fingernails into his flesh out of frustration but had to remain liken to the unphasable Black Mask they all knew him as. The mask helped with that.

" That kid's my prize!" The clown exclaimed, pointing a trembling finger to Jason. " _Mine_. Mineminemine! Look!" He ripped open the front of his buttoned-up purple coat before anyone could stop him, puffing his narrow chest out to show off the white T-shirt he was wearing with hastily scrawled on text stretching across it.

**I Killed Jason Todd!**

**(and reserve the sole right to do so)**

 

It was red and spreading from exposure to the rain it had suffered from at some point. Joker had clearly done it with a magic marker. Sionis raised his eyes from the brief examination of the text to meet Joker's crazy poison green stare, cocking a leathery brow as if the shirt was supposed to prove something.

" And your point is?"

" You can't all throw a beat-the-Robin party without me! I invented the sport and -" Stalling, Joker gasped suddenly and dramatically when his eyes landed on the crowbar among the sea of tools strewn out on the stage. His mouth trembled, trying to form words for a few seconds before they could come out. He actually looked betrayed, ripped off.

" I copyrighted that! I'm the only one who's allowed to-"

Jason couldn't hear what Joker was screaming about anymore, couldn't make out what Mask was saying or if he was saying anything at all. Hell, he could barely see them as anything but blurring shadows. It was like being underwater, every sound was ambient, booming and insensible.

And too far away to hear.

Maybe if he just fell asleep, let the world slip away, and he could wake up in the sweet, loving embrace of death. He missed it, like a child missed his mother. 

But Sionis wouldn't just let him die when still had uses for Jason.

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ooh, fuck, Mask, you don' pissed Mistah J off. Y'know how hard that is to do, right? Really fucking hard and you did it, * starts clapping slowly & sarcastically* nice job, you leather faced fucker. 
> 
> What do you think, is Joker too much?


	15. Chapter 15

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Joker finds perhaps the worst way to screw with Jason.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If I really wanted to fuck with you guys, I could reveal it was all a drug induced hallucination....
> 
> I may be satan incarnate, but I ain't the fucking anti-christ. Don't worry, instead of screwing you all over, Imma gonna be fulfilling request from people wanting things from both ends of the spectrum.
> 
> But don't read this if you're squeamish or a generally mentally sound person, I kinda lost it in my sadistic writing. Contains graphic violence, mindfuck, self-harm, attempted suicide.

" _B!_ Get down here, _now_!" 

The urgent tone of Tim's voice left no room to think this wasn't an emergency. Bruce was in the Cave within seconds, Dick on his heels, though considerably slower due to the stab wound he'd refused to stay at the hospital for. 

Small mouths filled with daggers of sharp teeth nibbled at away Dick's side, concentrating on the area around the wound Jason had caused, but it had missed everything important, so there was no way in hell Dick was going to sit back and lick his wounds while everyone else got their hands dirty. Not while he might be the only person who can get through to his brother. 

Alfred had Lian and although there were a series of traumas lingering from the incident, she was doing a little better, which allowed them all to focus on the search. 

Tim's eyes were wide as he stared fixated at the video playing on the computer screen, hands frozen like electrified spiders hovering above the keyboard and at a loss as to where to land.

" This was just sent to every major networking system," Tim told them when they appeared on either side of him. The monitor was showing a broadcast from Channel 5, where the news reporter looked flustered, disgusted even. Her brow was scrunched up and she was holding the microphone in a white-knuckle grip.

Dick and Bruce alike knew this would be bad even before she started talking.

 _" Today's breaking news,"_ she began, her voice bearing a sharp bite _, " is Batman forcing children to join in on his war against crime in Gotham City? The role of Robin has caused controversy ever since the first Boy Wonder made headlines over a decade ago. Stories and rumours have arisen since then that Batman is drafting underaged teens into child soldiers and by the earliest pictures taken of Robin, it's clear to see, the boy is in his early teenage years. However, nothing ever arose from those suspicions even when it should have, and people were able to overlook the underaged vigilante in favour of all the good Batman has done for Gotham.  But tonight, ladies and gentlemen, we have shocking footage that reveals the true colours of the Dark Knight. It was sent to us anonymously. We're playing the clip now."_

The screen cut to an unclear film. It was poor quality, grainy, ill-lit, not done with professional recording equipment, and still, they could make out Sionis's trademark white suit. And he was talking to someone hanging by their arms from the ceiling. The footage was cropped so that they were the only two people visible, which didn't give a lot else to focus on other than the red helmet and bat symbol of the same colour.

Dick gave a small gasp when he saw their estranged bat. 

Jason's face was hidden by his hood but that couldn't disguise how much he was shaking. How scared he was. Sionis was holding a crowbar to his face, dragging it along the edges and curves of his helmet to taunt him. And it was working. By god, was it working. It was taunting them almost as much as it was Jason.

It was only worsened when Sionis removed the helmet and let them see how distraught and terrified Jason looked beneath it. Even with the poor quality footage, Dick could tell his lips were trembling. 

His face now revealed, an explosion, an uproar of whistles and catcalls exploded from somewhere off screen and by the number of voices, there had to be tens of them.

 _" Damn! That bitch fine as hell!"_ some lowlife scumbag yelled out.

Dick's heart was sinking into a pit of dread in his stomach.

" Tim, get a location now," Bruce ordered roughly but Tim was already on it, fingers flying across the keyboard. There was a look of intense focus and at the same time, frustration on his face. Brows furrowed and eyes hard on the screen, he replied with,

" I'm trying. The signal's scrambled."

" Keep at it." Bruce's voice was nothing short of a growl by now, staring with angry dark eyes at the monitor and what was happening next. His jaw was set and fists clenched into tight balls, squeezing them way after his knuckles cracked.

 _" Who did you used to belong to? Who was your daddy before me?"_ Sionis asked and Jason paused to think. He thought for way too long. Even if he wasn't going to answer he should have known immediately who Black Mask was talking about but no, for the longest time, there was no recognition on his face.

From beside him, Dick felt Bruce stiffen. Was it because of 'belong to' and 'daddy' or the fact that it took so long before Jason finally replied?

 _" B - Batman?"_ Oh god, his voice was so frail and broken.

By now, Tim's brows had met with his hairline for tea. With every second of the clip that played he grew more and more surprised by Jason. This was an awful situation for him to be in and he understood the reactions, but Tim had never even imagined that Red Hood could be scared and seem so wounded.

He wondered how much of what had transpired between Jason and Sionis, Bruce had left untold. By Sionis's behaviour around Jason, it was a lot more than a beating here and there.

The footage rolled on.

_" My goodness. How on earth did that happen?"_

_" Wa... was Ro - Robin, s - sir."_

Fuck. They could all tell where this was going and it wasn't good in the least. 

_" How old were you when Batman recruited you?"_

_" F - fourteen, sir."_

_" And which Robin were you? Second? Third?"_

Another pause.

_" Second, sir."_

Then the clip ended abruptly, but it was clear there had been more to see. It'd been specifically cut and edited by the sender to reveal only those few things, which left the rest of Jason's fate unknown to the masses.

At least for now.

 _" There you have it, ladies and gentlemen."_ The news reported said when it cut back to her. She still bore that expression of repulsion and it made a lot more sense with context.

 _" Proof that Batman is drafting, if not forcing, underaged teens to join his war on crime. The man on the left has been confirmed to be local business executive and mafia boss, Roman Sionis, better known as Black Mask. Though the other clearly wears the Red Hood mantra, we've received no confirmation whether or not he, in fact, is Red Hood, as the idea of Batman's Boy Wonder growing up to be a gang lord is admittedly unimaginable. However, if he indeed was Robin at the age of fourteen, then the city of Gotham has been overlooking a very serious matter frowned upon around the world._  

_Child soldiers._

_But as the subject is clearly intimidated into this confession, we cannot confirm what he's saying as the truth just yet. Stay tuned for more updates regardi-"_

Tim paused there, hitting the space bar with his index hard enough to make it click. 

" This is fucking bad, Bruce." He spoke the obvious when he looked up at their mentor. " Now all of Gotham's gonna be thinkin' you're some sick child abuser. I mean - why the hell did Jason tell him all that? He wasn't even threatened. He just did it like it was his pleasure."

Dick mulled Tim's words over in his head while he nursed his side. Why? Because Jason was terrified out of his wits, forced, manipulated, mentally obliterated into acting out Sionis's words to the letter. He'd put Oliver in the hospital, stabbed his brother, almost killed Lian, and all without ever being fully aware of what he was doing. It was safe to say that again, Jason didn't know what he was made to do or say.

" He's confused, Tim." Dick finally said because Bruce wouldn't explain. He was trying to get a location on where the video was sent from by picking apart the footage frame by frame. Sionis had however taken great caution to reveal nothing too telling.

" Confused? Dick, he looked...." Tim paused to find the words with which to describe the face of the man who had once been second most terrifying in the family, ranked silver only by the Dark Knight. 

" Gone."

*

" There ya go, doll." Harley cooed as she smiled, pulling the syringe out of Jason's neck.

" That'll make you all nice and wakey for my puddin'."

The shot of epinephrine sent cold shivers tingling inside his veins for a second before it mixed with his blood and he could feel the effects of the adrenaline kick in near instantly. It stimulated his heart, improved his breathing a degree, and began rising his rapidly descending blood pressure. 

But this was no act of mercy or even of pity.

No. No such thing.

After a mostly one-sided argument, Joker and Sionis had reached a medium where in exchange for not ruining everything with his hissy fit, Joker could get his turn too.

And the Clown Prince of Crime wanted Jason conscious for his games. Hence the adrenaline shot that forced Jason awake despite his depleting lifeforce and broken body wanting so badly to just shut down and never have to start up again.

In the hours that had gone by, everything had become a scrambled up mix of pain and... Pain. It was probably a mercy that he couldn't recall half of what he had done with who, or what they had done to him. 

" Harley, be a dear and fetch me my most prized possession from the car?" Joker requested of Harley, and the jester gave a happy, vigorous nod that made the bells in her hat tinkle before bounding off to get whatever Joker valued most in this world.

To be honest, it had never even occurred to Sionis, who was still listening in, that the clown might have any material possession of worth. It just didn't seem like his cup of tea. And why did he need it if he was going to do as he always did, give Jason a few whacks with a crowbar and be done with it? 

Much as he wanted the clown to get the hell out of his meeting, Sionis was undeniably a little intrigued as to what the what this maniac had in store for his boy. Joker wasn't exactly respected among the rogues gallery, but certainly feared and like a toddler at a funeral, they needed to keep him pacified or he would ruin everything. Sionis would have in truth, rather drank Clorox bleach than given Joker his turn, but at least this should be interesting.

 With the adrenaline kicking in fast, Jason started to become more and more aware of his surroundings and the considerable pain he was in, but he wasn't crying or even whining like one would have expected, there seemed to be no time for that once his eyes landed on the Joker and registered him for perhaps the first time. 

Perception distorted though it may be, there would never be a situation where Jason wasn't terrified by the clown's presence.

" Oh no. Nononono." Jason whimpered, split and bruised lips trembling as he tried to prop himself up enough to move. Of course, he couldn't, not with the broken bones and torn muscles. He gasped when his dislocated shoulder popped back into place with the movement. It popped audibly with a wet, disgusting snap that made the weaker stomached rogues cringe. 

Though the notable villains such as Two-Face and Bane were still present, many had departed by now. Their gall hadn't lasted for the night and they'd become paranoid that Batman would burst in at any second.

But that was impossible. 

Before the video was sent to every major networking system, Sionis had ordered his techie to crop and cut out everything that might give the Bat a clue as to their location, as he had undoubtedly seen it by now.

Oh no, the Knight wouldn't be coming to save his precious little Robin any time soon.

" Here ya are, Mistah J!" Harley bounced back with a carefully, almost ritualistically folded bundle of black cloth held together with a red ribbon curled at both ends. Joker smiled at her rather warmly and took it carefully in both hands, caressing the surface with a delicately slow stroke before he pinched one end of the ribbon between his index finger and thumb and gave it a tug, pulling loose the bow. 

" Harley, please give the boy a shot of fuzzy juice. It should make this tonnes more fun!" 

Harley complied with a nod and smile, rummaging around the bag of stuff she'd brought out of the car for a syringe of hallucinogen. When she found it, she made quick work of stabbing Jason in the neck with it, Jason who was unable to get away from her and her puddin'. 

Joker unfurled the cloth, though it was more like a sheet, and pressed it to his face, taking in a long drag of its smoky scent. A nostalgic smile flickered over his deranged one, threatening to replace it for a few seconds.

Sionis had to look at the object, properly _look_ at it, for a moment before it clicked what it was and even after, he couldn't quite believe it.

" Is that Batman's cowl?" He managed to hide the surprise in his voice with his grim tone, but behind his mask it was evident. How the hell did Joker have that?

" Ya-huh." Joker grinned and with a flick of his wrists, tossed it over his head. It was way too big for him, his shoulders not even a third as broad as Batman's, and it kind of just flowed around his thin frame. He loved it so much he probably slept wrapped up in it. 

But as he pulled the cowl over his mess of green hair, Sionis could finally see the angle he was going for and why he wanted Jason on hallucinogens.

Sick, twisted, ingenious bastard.

This was taking Mask's own manipulations a notch further and he wished he'd have thought of it first.

Fuzzy juice, as Joker called it, was taking effect much faster than the epinephrine, making Jason's surroundings bob and sway in one big chromatic aberration. Colours were bouncing from inside the lines and forming distorted rainbows that made it very easy to spot the black human shaped blotch against it all. The blotch approached him until he could make out pointy ears, which meant it was Batman, but also a twisted red grin, and that belonged to Joker. 

According to Sir's words and his own experiences, Jason should be afraid of both, but it bothered him he couldn't tell which one this was. Still, his body took over when his messed up brain couldn't, and broken though it was, tried to force some distance between him and Bat-Joker. 

Joker chuckled merrily to himself when Jason tried dragging himself away, until he was trapped between him and the wall he'd so stupidly backed into. 

He was making small incoherent, intermittent noises of panic. Not quite whimpers or pleads but somewhere in between.

" What's the matter, baby bird? Uncle J's not gonna hurt you - but Batman might." He finished his sentence with a crackle of loud, ear-grating laughter. 

Jason was shivering like he had hypothermia, breath hitching and tears forming in his eyes the closer the warped figure got.

" Nonono, please no." He begged, those heavy tears he'd been holding spilling to leave trails down his ashen cheeks. Without thinking, he slammed his own head backwards into the heavy stone wall behind him, pain vibrating through his skull. He did it again, harder this time, throwing his entire weight back into the rock covered surface with a wet smack. Blood exploded to matter his hair and stain the wall, but he was still awake. Dammit. Jason didn't want to be awake anymore but the adrenaline forced him to be.

" _NO!_ Nonono!"

Jason continued slamming his head back until a hand shot out and grabbed him by the hair, holding him in place and putting a stop to his masochistic knock-out method.

" Oh, Jason, if you wanted pain that badly all you had to do was ask your Daddy Bats." Joker, or maybe Batman, sneered, right next to his ear and breath caressing his clotted red and onyx tresses. It was a horrible sensation, the worst Jason could imagine even after all the torture he'd suffered.

He closed his eyes to try to make the person go away. 

Suddenly the hand released his hair and was laid out flat on his abdomen. It was not feeling him out the way Dent had, but that didn't make it any more settling. Jason feebly tried kicking him away but he may as well not even have done that for all the good it did.

" My word, when was the last time you ate? You're empty as a popped balloon." Joker raised Jason's hand to trace over his own cracked lips with the tips of his remaining fingers.

From behind him, Harley sniggered and clapped her hands together. Probably jumped in place too. She knew her bae well enough to know where this was going.

She loved the way his sick mind operated.

" Better give you somethin' to eat, eh, kiddo? Can't have your starving before Daddy Bats makes a lasting impression."

Joker shoved Jason's fingers into his mouth and before Jason could even piece it together what was coming next, Joker punched below the chin so hard that it forced his teeth to clamp shut on his digits. The first knuckle of his ring finger got it the worst. It went up in searing flames of agony similarly to when Riddler mutilated him earlier and he didn't need to wait for his hand to be dragged back out to know he'd bitten through it.

Joker held his mouth shut to prevent him spitting the piece of himself out as he pulled Jason's hand back, tearing the strips of skin and tendons that still held until the connection was lost. 

Through it all, Jason never screamed even as blood gushed from his hand once more and the coppery tasting piece of meat sat on his tongue. He didn't know why but just couldn't find it within himself to express the agony. Maybe the hallucinogen tricked his brain into believing the pain was less than it was. Or maybe he prayed he was in a delusion.

" Go on, be a good boy and finish your dinner for daddy." 

Repulsion was thick like bile in Jason's mouth, a fresh set of tears forming in his eyes. His body was responding accurately to something he didn't feel. Just how concussed had he made himself with his session of self-harm?

Joker tipped Jason's head back and rubbed his throat with two fingers, a natural yet forcible method of making anyone swallow. He couldn't stop sniggering, pleased with himself and this ingenious little game. 

And he still had so many fun ideas.

Which one would he even initiate after this?

Jason did his best to resist the swallowing reflex Joker stimulated but he had so little fight left in him that he quickly lost. The finger went sliding down his throat, scraping past the ridges formed by cartilage in his windpipe. Suddenly all senses were restored to his body and what followed could be described as revulsion, but that would be a drastic understatement.

He shoved Joker way, succeeding only because the bat-clad clown allowed it. Maybe Jason tried to stand, maybe he didn't, but he fell onto his hands and knees hard, coughing, choking, his entire body wracking.

He couldn't stop himself from throwing up, the memory of biting through his finger worsening his constricting throat. With everything going so blurry, he didn't even know if he'd puked the damn thing back up.

Was it Batman or Joker who'd done this to him? Fuck, he still didn't know! 

Joker dug around in Harley's bag of goodies while the kid was sick, humming Ring Around the Rosie to himself merrily until he located a can of green spray paint and a lighter.

" Ohohoho." He chuckled to himself crazily, eyes glistening his insanity. 

" Bane, dear, be a doll and come hold the kid for me?" Joker inquired with the sweetest of all conceivable smiles and Bane complied, grinning. He was yet to have his go with Jason and was getting tired of waiting.

Sionis was actually growing a little bit concerned for his boy but still didn't step in. He was more worried that Joker would kill him than anything else, but the madman knew not to. Sionis had armed men waiting by in case he decided to ignore the rules of this game.

Jason had barely stopped vomiting when the next incredible wave of pain came in the form of an open flame on his bare and exposed back. He screamed but couldn't move, someone was holding his arms apart. Paint fumes were heavy in the air around him, his brain too scrambled to pinpoint where they were coming from. 

Joker almost lost himself in the laughter that came with the joy of using his homemade flamethrower on Batman's least favourite Robin. Lighter held with the flame overlapping the spray can's mouth, it set the paint he sprayed out on fire and turned it into a column of searing agony across Jason's back.

It cauterized the whore carving Zsasz had made for him but also added emphasis to it. It discoloured the raw flesh, turning red letters to green. When it healed up it would look like a disfigured, aged tattoo.

Jason screamed himself hoarse, yanking at his arms enveloped by Bane's huge hands. Bane gave a sound similar to a scoff and a chuckle, amused by Jason's pathetic efforts. The colossus of a man lifted him higher until his feet were no longer touching the ground, but that didn't stop Joker from roasting him and laughing all the way.

Harley was squealing with delight, calling out support to her bae like a sick little cheerleader.

" That's enough, Joker," Sionis said when it became clear it was getting too much for Jason to bear.

The burning didn't stop when Joker finally did, it actually got a lot worse. Jason could feel his was back was raw and his skin sliding off in large pieces, falling to their feet with disgusting soggy slops. 

" _Argh_." Jason sobbed, sucking in unsteady gasps through his clenched teeth that made every breath a hiss. There were no words for his flayed back to be described with. He should have blacked out from the agony his brain couldn't even comprehend, epinephrine standing firm as a wall between him and the sweet embrace of oblivion.

The shape that was looking more and more like Batman grinned at him with sick delight.

" Harley, dear, do we have any salt with us? We need to treat this burn now. Packing it with salt will disinfect it!"

" Oh, yes, puddin'! Good idea!"

Harley nodded enthusiastically and searched her bag, quickly locating the random salt shaker she had with her. She tossed it in a wide arc to Joker, who caught it mid-air and joggled it up and down, his fist a blur. 

Bane dropped Jason into an undignified mess on the ground, kicked him over onto his stomach, and came to stand over him, placing both boots over his arms to keep him down. The boy was panting wheezily, shuddering like he was cold all of a sudden. Jason's tears drained from his unfocusing eyes onto the concrete floor, wet and warm with his blood.

" Remember my name, baby bird?" Joker sneered in question as he unscrewed the shaker's lid.

Jason didn't even didn't even try to move to save himself the inevitable failure of the attempt when the burning white grains came down on his skinned back. Fluids were sucked from his burning muscles and no scream, no matter how tortured, could describe what Jason was going through. 

" C'mon, Robin! Say your daddy's name!" The clown screeched but it turned into a cackle somehow more piercing than the shrieks of indescribable white-hot agony.

" Say it, boyo, say my name! Say it! Bat-"

" B... Batman..." Jason mumbled through his teeth into the concrete, crying and shuddering with each letter of the word. Once he admitted it, the hallucinogen made the rest real. Looming above him, Jason saw that man who had told him everything was okay, what felt like a lifetime ago.

" _Joker_." Sionis finally stepped in, putting an abrupt and instantaneous halt to the clown's sadistic fun. " That's enough."

" C'mon, Blackie," Joker pouted with a smile, pulling away from torturing Jason. He slumped his shoulders, too-big cape sagging around his frame as part of his melodramatic act.

" Just lemme finish the kid off!"

" _No_." Sionis remained unwavering, glaring through his mask. " It's time for you and your painted Jersey bitch to get the hell out of here. Our deal's reached a conclusion."

" B - b - but he's barely even half dead!" Again, he had taken up the role of a bratty toddler when things weren't going his way. 

" Go, Joker. I won't ask a third time." That was a promise, they both knew it. 

With Joker seemingly being despatched, Bane started to shake Jason out of his stuporous delirium for whatever he had planned. His giant hands went around Jason's ribcage entirely, calloused palms scraping over the exposed flesh of his back and making it bleed.

Jason couldn't take this another round. He knew he couldn't.

Joker looked like he was about to start a scene, tear the whole place down in a frenzied fit because of something he perceived as injustice. 

But then he didn't.

He inclined his head and smiled at Sionis.

Alarm bells sounded right when they should have.

" Okay then, Romie. I and Harley really must get going anyway. See you around?" The clown prince of crime didn't wait for an answer, spinning around on his heel and descending the stairs of the stage while he removed the cowl and straightened his purple suit. He gestured for Harley and she followed while he folded Batman's cape back neatly, taking great care to keep the edges precise.

And humming. He was humming joyfully.

Sionis stared after them through narrowed eyes, watching until they were gone, door closed behind and blocking them from view. This was too easy. Everything about it screamed for caution but right now, he couldn't care less about the two crazy damn clowns. Better that they were just on their way with minimum damage to what he was trying to do here.

Sionis turned to Bane, instructing him to go easy on Jason because quite truthfully, his boy looked ready to die at any given moment. Thanks to the adrenaline shot, he was torturously awake, head leaning on his shoulder when Bane lifted him up again for god knows what reason.

And all the while, Jason kept feverishly murmuring,

" _Batman_.... it was  Batman."

 

Joker half skipped, half danced to his waiting clown car outside. Harley was practised with how they rolled, she took the cowl from him and put it on its shrine across the backseats, complete with a small altar and all. Harley was very careful to make sure it was exactly in the centre, how her deliciously crazy boyfriend demanded it be.

" What now, puddin'?" She asked once she closed the door with a loud, eager slam. Eager for what? Why the next phase of course. Her bae would never walk away like that unless he had more mania on his mind and a plan to execute.

" Now, Harley, we deliver the final blow to that poor, poor, poor, poor little Robin." Joker shook his head but kept on smiling, momentarily captured by the sheer brilliance and unorthodox method of this last part. It might be the best idea his villainous mind had ever birthed. Why hadn't he thought of this earlier?

Opportunity hadn't presented itself he guessed.

Joker searched his pockets and pulled out the burner phone he'd plastered completely with smiling emoji stickers. He dialled out a number with his thumb, raising it when he was done and resting it against his ear while it rang, connecting the call.

While he waited, he explained a little to Harley.

" The boy lost his life to me once, remember, Harl?"

" Oh yes, Mistah J! So funny!" She clapped her hands together and jumped in place like an anime girl, giggling with excitement.

" Imagine how much more devastating it would be - " 

The other end of the line was picked up.

_" Wayne residence, who is this?"_

" - if he owed it to me." Joker finished with a grin that made Harley stare at him in awe with hearts in her eyes.

*

" Master Bruce!" Alfred came running down the stairs leading to the Batcave too fast for his age. Dick, Tim, Bruce, Damian, all their attention snapped to him and the phone he was waving in one elevated hand.

" Alfred, who is it?" Bruce demanded, snatching it before the elderly butler could give his reply. He raised it to his ear and when he heard the familiar, sugary sweet voice with something sour to it, his blood froze.

 _" Darling! Hello!"_ Joker exclaimed once  his arch-enemy's and love-hate-obsession's breath come to the receiver. He would know it in any dark alley. That hiss that turned into a growl meant to be threatening.... it was like a lullaby to the madman.

" _Joker_..." Bruce's voice dropped to his 'bat voice', gravelly and foreboding. At hearing the clown's name, each Robin who was present either gasped or adopted an expression of shock, raised brows and parted jaws to boot.

_" Yes, yes, it's me. How are you? Feeling well, I hope. Anything causing stress for you? Bills? Business meetings? Repairs for the Batmobile?  - such a queer name by the way - Oh I know! How about one lost little Robin, mayhaps? Missin' one of 'em?"_

Bruce barely heard a word of that. Joker could talk a million miles per minute, but his brain homed in on who he knew the clown was implying. _Jason_.

" Where is he, Joker?" Bruce growled when inwardly he was terrified for his missing son. If Joker was there.... if he knew where Jason was... then it didn't bear thinking about. With that said, every horrible, agonising thing he would have done to Jason by now zipped through Bruce's mind at once in a vivid slideshow with audio.

 _" Oh, so you are missing poor little Jasey! Well, I happen to know where he is. And I'm in a generous, saintly mood, so I'll tell you....."_ Joker allowed for his voice to trail off momentarily, waiting for his enemy's reaction with anticipation he could just about control.

" Why would you tell me that? What do you want?"

Joker didn't even bother to hide what he was getting out of this. He was bursting at the seams with the want to tell him like a kid who'd had a good idea they just needed to share.

_" I want the boy to owe his life to me. It's so devastating, isn't it?! To think he would be dead without his dear uncle J..... that's so awful for him!  But the question is, could you do that to him? Seal the deal with me being the only reason he still draws breath? Are you that cruel, Batsy? Well, are you?"_

Was he? Bruce would worry about that later. He was desperate enough to recover his son to overlook the possibility of this being a trap. To overlook how Jason would feel about the source of the information.

" Where is he?"

 _" You're such a sadist, Bats."_ Joker paused to chuckle. No reason for it, of course, it's just what he did in mid-sentence. _" At the docks. Warehouse 25, overlooking the pier. Now, don't be late, I estimate Jason's got about an hour or so of life in him. Good luck!"_ With that last in a sing-song voice, he hung up, suspending the whole room in question. They had all heard the conversation but weren't sure what to make of it.

Except for Bruce. He had already grabbed his utility belt and was headed for the Batmobile. He fastened the belt and pulled his cowl over the glare on his face. Dick didn't take long to grab his own gear and run after, Tim and Damian on his heels.

" This might be a trap, Bruce." Tim said as he smoothened down the edges of his mask to make the spirit gum stick.

" I don't care." Was Bruce's curt reply. He got in the mobile and Damian joined him on the passenger side. Dick and Tim, or now Nightwing and Red Robin, took their motorcycles and raced after when Batman zoomed out of the cave, taillights leaving red trails to follow.

The Dark Knight scowled hard and the road ahead, tearing through the streets of Gotham the fastest way he knew how. He took every shortcut and made some of his own, but still, it felt way too slow. His knuckles were whitening beneath his gloves the harder he gripped the wheel, teeth grinding against each other.

 _Hold on Jason,_ he thought and prayed like he had once years ago, _just a little longer. Please don't die... Please…_

*

Bane held Jason aloft with his arms apart, steadily pulling them in opposing directions until the sockets popped and made them look inhumanely long.

Jason didn't scream, didn't beg or tell him no. 

He stared at the ground with drying tear streaks on either side of his face.  He very much felt the pain and knew he should be screaming, but he was tired of screaming. Tired of this agony that wouldn't end. 

He was holding his breath but not because he was readying himself for anything, he was hoping he could asphyxiate himself to death. He knew his body would automatically start sucking in air once he passed out regardless of what he wanted, but he had to try. 

He needed to make this end.

Maybe if he managed to get Bane's dick in his mouth, he could choke himself with that?

No. Death by blowjob might be the one indignity he wouldn't suffer. If that was up to him, at least. Maybe Bane or one of the various other people who could choose what was going to happen to him had other ideas.

" You're no fun when you're not crying like a bitch." Bane said, dropping him with a dull thwap. Jason fell onto his back, dirt sticking to his raw muscle. And he didn't care. Not one bit. Not as his flesh ground against the ground or one shoulder reunited with its God-intended place.

Maybe Bane would beat him to make him scream, and Jason would subsequently die from pain? 

Hopefully.

But being flayed, mutilated, raped, burned, beaten, forced to fucking cannibalise himself and still he was alive? What could a few more kicks do, really?

" Sionis, I think your boy-toy is broken." Bane told him, gesturing to Jason where he lay sprawled out, staring at the ceiling with way too much fixation. God, he just wanted to die.

Was that really too much to ask? Death? Quick or slow? Jason would settle for slow if it meant this would stop.

Sionis looked at Jason, weary after all hours of watching villains take their grudges out. 

The kid did indeed look broken, but that was nothing new. This, however, was different.

" Jason," 

Stockholm syndrome demanded Jason respond to the only voice he knew he could trust. With the last bit of strength he possessed, he managed to get his head to turn with colossal effort.

" S - sir?" He could barely make himself audible but not keep the cracks from his voice, which was more of a plead for death.

A plead for just someone to kill him.

Bullet to the head, disembowelment, lunch for Killer Crock, Jason would take any one of those.

" Let's take a break, shall we, son? You've suffered enough for one night." Sionis said and this wasn't by any means an act of mercy, sympathy or anything related. One more slap and it looked like Jason would toss life away when he was still relevant. Leverage. For a little more time, he could be used as leverage against his Daddy Bats. Not to mention when he'd recovered somewhat, more villains would want to take their turns- 

Above them, the skylight burst with an ear-shattering _smash_. As if that was a cue, the power cut off and the room filled with tear gas. From all around, grunts, screams, and the sounds of flesh hitting flesh could be heard and through all of it, through the commotion and villains falling left and right, Sionis spotted _him_. 

Batman, his murderous glare trained directly on Sionis.

And he looked pissed the fuck off.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> In my personal opinion, Jason owing his life to Joker is thousands of times worse than losing it to him. Really screwed with him there. Nice job, Mistah J. 
> 
>  
> 
> While a lot of versions of the Joker do not know who Batman is, mine does. He knows who Jason Todd is, it shouldn't be too hard for a psychopathic anarchist mastermind to figure out the rest. His war is with Batman, though, not Bruce Wayne, so Bruce Wayne is in the clear.


	16. Chapter 16

" So what's your dealio, Hughes?" Roy inquired, pushing the best grin on his face that he could, regardless of the leather straps across his remaining limbs. The lab coated man he'd learned the name of unsurprisingly didn't reply or pay him any heed outside of connecting IVs to him. Roy didn't know what they planned on pumping into him, but he was sure it wasn't a far-off version of what they'd done to Jason. 

Roy adjusted his position a notch, the cold steel of the surgical table sending chills through the already cold muscles of his exposed back. 

" You like, on Black Mask's favourite list or...? He seems to trust you... maybe like you? Not as much as he likes Jason, of course." Roy chuckled despite himself. Hughes continued to ignore him and prepared another thin tube attached to a needle.

" You guys friends or somethin'? Blackie didn't come by me as the friendship is magic kinda guy but who knows? Maybe he has a heart beneath those layers of megalomania and visually offensiveness?" The more Roy spoke, the more Hughes was visibly getting ticked off. He was tense and frowning hard and dark at the IV he was connecting into the inside of Roy's elbow. The archer winced slightly when the point pricked his skin, harder than was necessary he knew.

But this was going accordingly.

" Or were you... y'know," he winked suggestively, " a _good_ employee? Doing anything and _everything_ your boss wants? Must've hurt when Blackie developed standards and good taste and decided Jason was a thousand times better? I mean, he's pretty as hell and in bed? My god," he shook his head with a whistle through his teeth, " he's a dream."

Finally, Hughes couldn't bite his tongue any longer.

" Judging by how often Black Mask has him on his back, I can imagine so."

That was meant to get under Roy's skin but he quite effectively blanked it out. He continued on grinning like nothing was wrong, the stretch on his facial muscles reminding him with a burning tingle that the brand was still there.

And always would be.

" Is that jealousy I detect in your voice? Was I right, Hughes? Were you and Si - _ah!_ " Roy muffled a yelp with his teeth around his lip when Hughes stabbed a syringe deeper into his arm, pricking the bone with the point. He came right up into Roy's face with a glare on his. The days of being taunted had finally driven him to the brink.

" If you don't shut the fuck up, Harper, I'll leave you worse off than Jas - _argh!"_

_Smack!_

As much as the straps across his arms and legs allowed, Roy threw his weight forth, catching Hughes in the face with his head and a spurt of blood. With a gasp of pain, Hughes stumbled backwards, cupping his broken nose and the red pooling into his hand while Roy twisted, turned, and managed to yank his amputated arm limb and granted himself enough free range of movement to twist his wrist and-

_Pop!_

Dislocate his thumb. He winced with the wet squelch from his hand that vibrated sparks through his muscles, but didn't linger on it when Hughes was returning with a rage-filled, bordering on murderous glare and a shot of sedative in his hand. Roy caught sight of him from the corner of his eye, just as he plunged the syringe down. He looked nothing short of terrifying with blood running sleek down his deranged face.

But he deserved the pain and so much more. 

Reaction time sluggish from torture, Roy barely managed to awkwardly catch Hughes' forearm against his own, the point of the syringe half an inch from his eye.

Two damn arms would be fan-fuckin-tastic right now.

Roy swung his balled fist into the doctor's face with a crack of something further breaking. Hughes stumbled, tripped, fell, and _smack_. The sound was drenched and _s_ _olid_.

Roy didn't look where he fell and pulled the restraints off his legs before Hughes could come back. He slid off the aluminium table. This thumb plopped back into place with the movement.

" _Ngh_." A whimper was suppressed by his closed mouth when his feet touched the ground. He hadn't used his legs in the past 24 hours, they were stiff and barely held him upright.

The first few steps were nothing short of him dragging his feet. He manoeuvred himself around the table tenderly to the side where Hughes had fallen.

Lying on his back, eyes wide and staring at the ceiling, a halo of red spreading around his head from the indentation in his skull.

Roy could tell Hughes wouldn't be a problem any more and he felt nothing but morbid satisfaction. Fuck the Bat's no-kill rule after everything that fucker had done for Sionis and his sick little games.

With a glimmer of fascination on his face no less.

Roy spat at his corpse.

But he couldn't savour the guilt-free accidental killing. The guards would be doing their rounds soon and find the body and him missing. They'd trip security, put the place into lockdown, and he would never get out.

And he needed to get to Lian and Jason too badly to get captured a second time.

Roy wrapped a handful of Hughes' pinkish hued lab coat around his fist and gritting his teeth, started dragging him behind the cover of the table. It would hide the body for now.

The average man weighed 85 kilos and on Roy's tortured and dehydrated body that was no easy weight to bear, with one arm especially. But with his legs quickly returning to the level of function he needed them to be, he soon had the body out of sight and out of mind.

Then he mopped up the trail of dark blood as best he could with a spare lab coat hanging by the door and trashed it.

" Right," Roy exhaled heavily once that was done, hand on his hip and taking a second to look over the crime scene for anything he'd missed.

When he was sure it was as clean as he could get it, he snatched Hughes' key card from around his neck and cautiously stepped out of the room.

The door lead into a dark hall with no guards on duty at the moment, a perfect opportunity. Roy kept close to the walls,  the brush of them against his bruised back getting to him. His shirtless state didn't help.

Roy had been chaperoned around this place enough to have a rough estimate of where everything was. The control room resided opposite the living room Sionis had converted into his and Jason's private hell on earth.

The control room would most definitely have a radio or other means of communication because Arsenal could fight his way out of here.

But Roy Harper?

With an injured body, one arm, and no bow or quiver? That wasn't bloody happening. He needed some outside assistance, pronto.

" Hey, Jer, think the boss is gonna off Hoody now that he's got that ginger?"

The guards voices around the corner alerted Roy in the nick of time. He pressed himself into the wall and held his breath, trying to make himself as small and unnoticeable as possible.

Also, hope and fucking pray that they didn't take a turn and that they just keep walking.

He stiffened, heartbeat quickening as the beam of their flashlight fell across the passage and their footsteps grew nearer and louder.

" Dunno. Maybe? Hood was alright before Mask fucked with his head but he's pretty useless now that he's dying and all."

Roy frowned as he listened in.

_Dying?_

He knew Jason was in an atrocious state, both physically and mentally, but unless he was missing something here, recovery should be a possibility, if a far off in the future one.

It made him think back to what Sionis said.

_' With Jason dead...'_

Roy pulled a face, the memory of that man's taste in his mouth still thick on his tongue. He could brush his teeth or drink bleach for the rest of his life and still never forget it.

Just one in the many reasons he was going to murder the bastard.

Talking amongst themselves, the guards got closer and closer until Roy could smell their cologne. It was a cheap brand.

" Pretty degrading, huh? I mean, once Red Hood, fear of Gotham's criminal underbelly and a frequent thorn in Batman's side, now Black Mask's boy-toy."

" Don't forget Mask made him cry on that feed by waving a fucking crowbar in his face. What's up with that? Guy got some intense fear of tools?"

" If he did, would he have fucked that ginger?"

They both burst out laughing in what sounded like the rowdy barking of a couple of wild dogs.

Brow furrowed, Roy didn't focus on that or the insult.

Feed? What feed?

What the fuck had Sionis done to Jason now?

He needed to get out of here now and find him.

The guards passed, some act of mercy keeping them going straight ahead. Roy waited for them to be out of hearing range and their flashlight's beam to have vanished around the next corner before he continued on.

He snuck in silence that rivalled the Dark Knight's ability to keep a low profile until he was at the locked door of the control room. A quick swipe of Hughes' key card through the reader saw it open with a mechanical _ping_.

" Doctor Hughes-" When the door slid open, the guard on watch turned in his seat to address who he thought the arrival was, then he saw Roy, angry and speckled in Hughes' freshly drawn blood.

" You're not Hughes!"

" No shit." Roy murmured. He was not in a good mood, so much so he didn't feel bad when he buried his balled up fist in the man's face the second he was about to trip the alarm. A sweep of Roy's leg had his feet out from under him and a kick to his face when he was down rendered him unconscious.

That done, Roy locked the door. Beside it, he opened the control panel hiding a multitude of varicoloured wires behind it and overwrote the entrance codes, making himself the only person capable of opening it.

Never in his life had he been so glad he listened to Oliver rambling on about how to hotwire a door.

He had already known how, of course, but the sound of his mentor's voice in his head, telling him what to do, was comforting.

_'Tie up the guard, Roy. He could wake up any minute and take you down. You're at a disadvantage here.'_

Right. Of course.

There were shelves in the room, stockpiled with computer and surveillance equipment. Roy grabbed a rolled up extension cord and using his teeth and one remaining hand, managed to restrain the unconscious guard's arms tight behind his back, but it was no easy task.

God, Roy never realised how much he'd taken having two arms for granted. Everything was ten times as hard now.

He exhaled deeply.

_What's next?_

_'Turn on the computer. See if you can access their database and contact someone you know. Someone good at kicking ass.'_

" I know, Ollie. Already on it."

Roy pulled sat down on the seat the guard had left pulled out and switched the computer on.

" Let's see...."

Talking to himself was the least of his troubles right now.

It took him two tries to get the twelve digit password right and unlock the computer. Files were spread out across the screen's bland background, one titled R/Hood wiretap 01.

02 through 0.20 were in line next to it.

He frowned, red brows wrinkling his forehead.

_The fuck?_

Desperate to know as he was, Roy knew his priority had to be to reach out and get himself some help before the guards realised anything was wrong, which was when the gig was officially up.

He made fast work of intercepting a radio frequency known only to him and a select few other people. He awkwardly pulled a headset over his messed up hair and adjusted the mic to his lips.

" Titans, come in. Anyone copy?"

Nothing. Just static crackling.

Roy licked his lips nervously. He really couldn't afford for them not to pick up. They were his literal only hope.

" Come in, Titans." He reattempted. " Anyon-"

_" Titans Tower receiving. Who is this? Over."_

Oh, thank fuck. It sounded like Donna Troy was on the line.

Roy allowed himself a small smile of dry optimism.

" Arsenal. I'm in a tight spot and I don't have time to explain but I need you to patch my location through to Starfire. I need her to pick me up. Can you do that? Over."

There was a short silence, lasting only seconds but to Roy it seemed to stretch on for hours.

 _" Copy that, Arsenal. Send your coordinates. Over."_ Donna finally replied and with it eased his heartbeat.

" Forwarding them now." With a few clicks of the keyboard, Roy broadcasted his whereabouts to the Titans Tower. He may not know where the hell he was but found solace in the fact that they now did.

_" Coordinates received, Arsenal. We're dispatching Starfire now. Her ETA is half an hour. Think you can hold out that long?"_

Roy flicked through the feed of the various cameras located on the property, carefully studying the screens for any sign that the guards knew something was up.

So far, so good.

" Should be able to but I need to shut the radio off now, in case someone finds the frequency and listens in." Roy said as a precaution because this far into getting out of here and back to his daughter, he wasn't taking any risks. No matter how small or unlikely.

_" Ten-four. Hang tight, Roy. Kori's on her way."_

_Click._

The connection cut off, leaving him with the bright glare of the computer screen and an earful of static.

Roy blinked heavily at the monitor for moments after he was alone again, say for the company of the man who he knocked out cold.

All he had to do now was wait for thirty minutes and Kori would be here to save him like they were back in their outlaw days. The rest was a piece of cake.

Half an hour, thirty minutes, 1800 seconds, 1800000  milliseconds,  1800000000 microseconds - 

Roy had to mentally slap himself for over complicating the equation and focused on the screen instead of dissecting Kori's eta into all of its variables.

He remembered the file, _R/Hood wiretap 01_ , and returned to it. Hesitantly at first, he clicked twice and some sort of audio receiver was loading soon. The screen was black with nothing definitive to it, but the instant the volume came on something in Roy shattered.

 _Scuffling_. Someone was struggling and fighting but above that, he could make out tortured screams and cries.

And he would recognise Jason's voice anywhere, no matter how thickly pain was mangling it.

_" No! Nononono! Not this - not this!"_

He sounded  like a terrified animal, thrashing and pleading with someone who by the sound of it, was holding him down with full force.

The next shriek tore a bloody hole into Roy's chest and he rapidly flicked through every other file in the folder but couldn't get a visual anywhere. Nothing to give him any sort of idea what was happening to Jason.

And where the fuck were these wiretaps? They sounded so close to Jason that Roy could hear his breath, ragged and pained and fast. Much too fast.

Then suddenly the audio cut off and left him with nothing but a loud ringing like a flat line.

Lips trembling, Roy stared wide-eyed at the empty screen. He could hear nothing over his heart palpitating.

There was only one reason his mind went to when wiretap went quiet.

" Oh god, please no." He whispered.

 

* * *

 

 

  
Sionis had acted exactly as they had expected. The moment the bat infantry burst in, he went for Jason to use as leverage or a shield if he needed it. He already had a gun drawn from the concealing confines of his suit, about to train it on Jason's head when Nightwing lunged from his perch on the roof beams above them with a cry of sheer anger.

The stab wound didn't ache at that moment. All colour he saw had melted into one constant pulsating red hue long before he swung his escrima stick down into the arm Sionis had extended towards Jason and shattered the damn thing with a crack that could have turned anyone's stomach. The scream of pain was satisfactory but the hot rush of blood splattering across Nightwing's masked face?

Well, that was even better.

" You're gonna fucking regret that!" Sionis scream-promised him, the sleeve of his immaculate white suit for once less than perfect with the red stains spilling from his trembling and broken limb, spreading across it fast.

Nightwing paid no heed to what he knew weren't capable of being more than idle threats, about to pound the sadistic bastard into a mush with his escrima sticks and probably not pay heed to the no-kill rule when- 

" Jason - _terminate_!" Sionis yelled the order clear over the deafening sounds of combat going on around them and it woke - _snapped_ , Jason out of his half-dead and unresponsive state.

He'd been laying on his back at Nightwing's feet, detached from every bit of chaos unfurling around him until he heard that word. Jason's hand was like lightning the way it snatched the knife from Nightwing's boot, turned it in his clasp to point the blade at his own chest, and plunged it down. 

" _NO!"_ The screamed tore itself from Nightwing's lungs. He didn't care that he could see Sionis escape in the corner of his eye, he threw his arm in between Jason and the knife, blade sinking deep into the kevlar padding over his skin, seconds before it would have pierced his brother's heart. 

Jason _hissed_ like he was a deranged animal and threw his head back only to slam it into Nightwing's face with concussive force. Or at least he would have, if he'd had an inch of strength left anywhere in his body. Dick caught him halfway in his attempt and straddled his arms to his sides while he thrashed so madly he was reopening all his numerous wounds, the few droplets of blood he had left soon flowing to the ground in rivers.

" Jay! Jay, stoppit, please!" 

Jason was throwing himself any way he could, screaming and struggling, teeth bared and eyes wide. Dick fastened his arms tighter around Jason but the way he screamed in agony when he did and his bones crunched and shifted -  his fingers slipped down Jason's raw back, unable to get a grip of him even when he tried- 

Dick gasped violently like someone hit him and stumbled back, unwillingly dropping Jason back onto the floor with another scream from him.

Dick couldn't stop staring at him, couldn't believe the crippling extent of what Sionis had done to him. Skinned - he'd been _skinned_ , burned and his hands - _god_ , what had they done to his hands? There were fingers missing, lopped through and pulled off.

Dick's Kevlar gloves came back wet and glistening with blood, tissue fluids, and god knows what else and he couldn't force  his gaze elsewhere, held unwilling captive to the gore.

With his brother frozen in the horror of it all, Jason tried to go for the shiv strewn out on the bloody stage when the sound of Batman's wings unfurling above him scared him shitless.

 _Thud_.

There was the heavy, menacing sound of the Dark Knight's boots landing mere feet from him.

He was back. The dark figure was above him again, Jason was at his feet, at his nonexistent mercy. He was here to hurt him. Make him bleed and make him cry. Pick him to pieces and shred the pieces to nothing.

All over again.

Those covered white eyes bore down on Jason and he approached.

The order to terminate himself fast forgotten, Jason was screaming in terror and doing the few things his broken body could do get away from Batman. He kicked out with one leg fractured and clawed his remaining fingers and tried to drag himself back, not caring of the agony he was causing himself.

Jason couldn't breathe. His heart was slamming against his ribs, bruising him and trying to smash through the fractured cage of bone. He could feel the shadow above him, arms outstretched, trying to reach him, but there was hesitancy.

Just then electrical spiders started to crawl beneath Jason's skin and inside his veins. It was tingling before it started to burn, like small machines within him were whirring to life.

This always happened before he got shocked.

" No! Nononono! Not this - not this!" In the blind fit of all-consuming panic, Jason was a split second from bashing his skull open on the ground when a flash of blue and someone's hands were around his arms again.

He couldn't move. Couldn't get away.

The terror intensified a thousand fold and he wasn't even screaming out words anymore.

Just raw indescribable fear.

" Jason, its okay! We're not going to hurt you!" The person holding him exclaimed, tone pleading with him.

There was his name again. God, how did they know his name?

 _Jason! Jason!_ **_Jasonjasonjasonjason_** \- over and over and over again! Reverberating around his head in a million distorted, warped shrieks in place of voices.

Batman stabbed the small sharp point of into his neck. A syringe. What was in it - hallucinogens or more epinephrine to force him awake?!

Mercifully, it couldn't be adrenaline because he was getting drowsy near instantly.

Was he sweet embrace of death finally going to reclaim him?

Too much to pray for.

The blackness was starting to swamp him.

Oblivion could have been a fragment of comfort if  Jason didn't know for certain that he was going to wake up in another white room, tied down - or held - ready to be used and hurt and tortured.

 _Broken_.

" Nonono... No...n... No." Jason whimpered with the last of his lessening consciousness, feebly moving his arms and legs in the direction of the two men in the faint hope they could leave him alone to die in the throes of his suffering. It would be _mercy_.

But they wouldn't leave him alone. One of them promised it and it felt like the weight of a new death sentence landed on Jason's shoulders.

Again.

It was all going to happen again.

 

* * *

 

Nightwing froze, Batman hesitated, neither of them had been ready for the horrific extent of cruelty Jason had been subject to. He kept screaming and hurting himself worse, Batman had had no choice but to sedate him for his own good.

" B.. Batman," Nightwing stammered, audible even over the chaos of Robin and Red Robin holding back the last of the retreating rogues.

Jason was limp in his arms however still whimpering and crying, brow scrunching and eyes squeezed shut tight. Tears were rolling from betwixt his lashes. The drug wasn't enough to dull the pain.

" Bl - Black Mask-" Dick was at a loss for words, lips trembling as they tried to form a sentence. He set Jason down and took a few steps back. He was shaking like Bruce had never seen him do before.

" L - look what he d - did-" Feebly, he gestured to the destroyed form on the ground who he once knew as his brother.

" Nightwing-"

Before Batman could say what he'd wanted to, Dick had turned on his heel and was running across the stage. Indescribable rage burned on his face and the streaked with red escrima stick clasped in his fist yearned for blood.

" _Nightwing!"_ The Dark Knight barked after but wasn't heard or acknowledged.

He was going after Sionis, Batman knew, and should have pursued him before he did anything he'd possibly not even regret, but he'd be damned if he pushed Jason aside for another second.

At his feet, Jason was whimpering and trying even in oblivion to curl protectively around himself. Batman knelt and for once in his existence, didn't know what to do. He was captivated by the gruesome horrors the rogues had done.

He needed to get his son to a hospital and now, but how could he even pick him up when all his bones looked broken and the skin was melted off his carved back?

Last time they had done this, Jason had been dead.

" Hold on, son. Hold on." Batman half begged, half whispered. He unfastened his cape with a fluid swish and spread it over Jason as carefully as his shaking hands allowed. He wrapped his broken body in it and gathered Jason tenderly into his arms.

So many things shifted and crunched as he did and Jason whined pitifully into his shoulder, more tears flowing as he pushed his face against Batman.

Batman's stomach lurched as much as his heart bled. This was so much like before, almost exactly the sam-

" Batman!" Damian landed loudly on both feet beside him, a hard expression set into his small face.

" I and Red Robin can finish here, you must get Todd help now!"

The urgent tone of his voice snapped Batman out of the tranced state and he suddenly realised how much blood was on the floor and how weakly Jason was breathing.

He nodded once towards Damian and he was running as fast as he could with Jason in his arms. But he weighed so much less than Batman remembered, at least forty pounds less. He was afraid one hard enough jolt and Jason would shatter into million pieces.

He didn't even know what happened in between turning his back on his second youngests and getting Jason into the Batmobile.

He'd never urged more speed out of the vehicle than he did then. He was flooring it the whole while they tore out of the dockyard and into Gotham.

Every few seconds, Batman rapidly glanced to Jason beside him, slumped over with only the seatbelt across his chest and arms keeping him semi-still in the reclined seat.

God, he was so pale and the black cape draped around him made his skin look even whiter than reality told.

" Please, Jason, please, don't..." Batman couldn't finish the plea when he didn't know if what he was praying for would be the cruellest thing in the world for Jason.

Up until seeing his son, Batman had held a small crumb of hope that something was there left to salvage.

Even after Dick found Jason in Roy's apartment, terrified of his mentor beyond reason, Batman had possessed that one small hope.

...But now?

Now that was up for debate.

The Batmobile's brakes screeched like tortured banshees when he swerved to the side of Leslie Thompkins' clinic in crime alley.

Everyone had seen the footage Sionis sent to the news, any doctor with half a brain would recognise Jason as Red Hood and call the cops if Batman took him to Gotham General. They would try to cuff him, Jason would panic and hurt himself or someone else gravely.

And Batman would never let anyone who intended to hurt his son near him, ever again. Nor was he about to let Jason out of his sight.

Leslie was the only person he could trust and who might be able to save Jason's life. She was capable of performing surgery, after all. But could she work miracles?

Batman threw open his side door and left it that way. He didn't care if someone tried to steal the damn car right now.

There was only one thing he cared about at that moment.

One person.

His dying son.

He went for the passenger side and eased Jason back into his hold as gently as the urgency of the situation allowed.

" Mmhh... _Hurts_...." Jason whimpered near incoherently,  beads of cold sweat mixing with the dry blood on his ashen and chalky face. It was the only bit of colour left on his cheeks.

" I know, darling, I know," Batman tried soothing his son while he carried him towards the clinic's back door. He was very aware of the fear creeping into his voice with every word he spoke.

No part of him wasn't afraid.

Jason's head was against Batman's shoulder and his mangled fist curling around what little of the cowl he was strong enough to hold on to. Every movement, no matter how small, made him give a barely audible moan of pain.

" Shh. It's okay," he whispered despite the rush that made him sound breathy, " stay with me a little longer, Jaybird, please. We're going to get you fixed up."

Batman didn't believe this next part no matter how much he wanted to.

" You'll be okay."

That made Jason tense and push feebly against Batman's chest, his eyes fleetingly opening, only to fall heavily shut once more with a groan.

Batman's breaking, anxious heart beat faster. It sounded like a stampede in his chest.

Leslie was waiting by the door, ready to open it because thank fuck, he'd called ahead moments after Joker ended his call. The call that was the only reason they found Jason when they did, and not his cold dead corpse.

Although, that might the reality very soon.

Leslie hurried over when she saw them coming, strands of her hair messily shoved into a ponytail and her eyes still dilated from sleep.

But she was here. Like she had promised. She would help.

" Oh my god." Was all she could utter when she saw Jason, bloodied, cut up and smashed, more dead than alive. He was barely managing the wet rattling breaths made raspy by his collapsed lung.

Leslie raised her horror-stricken eyes to lock with Batman's through his mask and all he saw was the hopelessness on her face.

Complete and utter hopelessness.

But she quickly pushed it aside in a way only she could and in its place forced a set expression of fierce determination to do anyhing and everything she could to save Jason's life.

" Get him inside. _Hurry_."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry if this is rushed, I wrote it on my phone because my laptop died.
> 
> A moment of silence for my fingers. RIP.


	17. Chapter 17

Dick's boots thudded against the smooth surface of the linoleum floor as he entered Leslie Thompkins' clinic through the window. As was to be expected after hours, the halls were dark and completely devoid of sound, say for the ticking of the clock hung above the reception desk.

 Dick didn't take idle steps or dawdle around, he strode fast and almost purposefully, his posture incredibly stiff and one blood splattered escrima stick hanging from his fist.

 There was blood on his arm too, streaming upward across his sleeve until it met with his shoulder. Speckles of it were also on his face, his neck, chest, legs, in his hair, _everywhere_.

And none of it was his.

Some of it belonged to Jason and the rest? The rest he'd spilt from the veins of a much more deserving man.

 _The bastard had it coming it,_ he kept telling himself. And no part of him doubted it.

His face was twisted up into a fearsome glower and his teeth still bared, his expression unhidden even by his mask. Dick wasn't aware his muscles were still shaking from the wild torrents of adrenaline that had fueled him as he walked into the lobby outside what he knew to be the operating theatre.

Bruce was there, well _Batman_ was, sitting slumped over in one of the cheap chairs that were bolted to the floor. His head was in his hands, cowl drawn back to reveal his hooked fingers clawing into his scalp, strands of his hair sticking from between them.

Dick had never seen him like this. Distraught, hopeless, _scared_. He hadn't even returned to the warehouse to take out the rest of the rogues, who were practically laid out on a silver platter.

Bruce lifted his head and looked up when he heard the too loud, ear-pricking squeak of the hard rubber soles of Dick's boots slipping against  the recently waxed floor

Bruce's eyes were red, bloodshot.

Dick didn't come any closer. He planted both his feet firmly, side by side, on the ground two meters away from his father figure.

He didn't know why but the distance was what he wanted.

" How is he?" Dick pushed himself to ask. He was frustrated with himself. _Ashamed_ of the way he'd abandoned Bruce and abandoned _Jason_ at the warehouse. But at the same time, he felt nothing but self-righteous satisfaction that he had.

" _Bad_. He's lost a lot of blood and needed a transfusion. I -" with a wildly uncoordinated movement, he gestured to the red pinprick on the inside of his elbow. The sleeve was rolled up to let Dick see.

"... Gave him some of mine." Bruce finished heavily. His way, Dick bet, of trying to make this better. He was sure Leslie had an abundance of Jason's blood type stored away, but it just had to be Bruce's blood he got.

Because it would _help_. 

No. It _wouldn't_ , Dick snapped almost audibly. The only blood that could set any of this remotely right was that of each and every rogue who had laid their disgusting hands on Jason.

" Is he going to be alright?" Dick asked, not looking up from where he stared darkly at the floor. The black tiles reminded him of Sionis' stupid mask.

And the rogue's gallery better pray to god that Jason was going to pull through. Maybe Dick would go easier on them then. After all, he had promised Jason everything would be okay right before everything went spiralling right to hell.

Dick couldn't make up for his broken pledge, but he didn't have to let that filth get away with a few hours behind Arkham's revolving doors.

" I don't know. Leslie says we won't be able to tell until he's out of surgery." Bruce looked like he wanted, _needed_ , for Dick to try to assure him that Jason would recover with time. But Dick wasn't going to do that because A, that would be a lie, and B, Bruce needed to see the true and horrifying extent of what _they_ did. It would make him far more understanding of what Dick planned in return.

" Hmph." Was all Dick could muster in place of a response, a sort of thoughtful murmur with no thought behind it.

His normal mind finally kicking in, Bruce finally rose and approached him and Dick didn't bother taking a step back or trying to hide the bloodstained iron bar still hanging from his hand. He didn't care if Bruce saw it or not.

" Where did you go, Dick?" Bruce asked when he was less than two feet away, which was when his sights by and by fell upon the escrima stick and the thick clots of red and fragments of pinkish bone matter that stained it.

By his expression, the contents of his veins ran cold and the colour from his already pale face drained to nil.

" Dick.... _What_. Did you do?" Bruce asked with an unmistakable hint of dread in his voice. Tipping his head up, Dick locked stares with Bruce, his crystalline blue eyes hard and cold and beneath the layers, something new. Something to be _afraid_ of.

Dick's mind wandered back to _it_.

_What did he do?_

 

* * *

 

_Outside in the dockyard, by his limo and security guards, is where Dick caught up with Sionis, about to bolt like he always did when things turned a fraction towards the south._

_The guards were armed and Sionis had enough confidence bestowed in them to spectate while they made a move to protect him and ward off Nightwing. They must have thought a round of bullets would scare him away, send him running back to his daddy bats._

_They never found out if their assumption was correct as Dick had disabled and knocked them out long before they had a chance to unleash the first onslaught of bullets._

_The next thing Dick was aware of was that he had a fistful of Sionis' suit jacket and was pinning him against the side of the limo hard enough to leave hairline fractures in the window._

_Up until now, everything had been an angry blur of running and swinging his escrima sticks into every moron who had the balls and the death wish go for him._

_Yet even cornered and pinned, Sionis still had the gall to sneer at Dick as if nothing was wrong. Dick couldn't see it through the mask that kept his entire face under wraps, but he sure as hell felt the weight of the arrogant, uncaring expression._

_It was as if Sionis had wanted to get caught. But why? Dick didn't really give a damn._

_" Gonna kill me now, pretty boy?" Sionis taunted through an audible disparaging grin in his voice._

_Dick fastened his hold tighter and pressed the butt of his escrima stick up against the exposed underside of Sionis' throat, feeling him swallow against it. But it wasn't a nervous swallow or anything even slightly as satisfactory._

_Dick was grinding his teeth together, muscles wanting so badly to give in to the angry tremors. But he couldn't let this bastard think he was scared of doing what Black Mask deserved._

_" But you're not allowed to kill, are you, sonny boy?" Sionis continued, confident despite his vulnerable predicament._

_" Shut up." Dick hissed through a cage of clenched white denta. He could feel the points of his canines chip the harder he pressed his jaws together._

_This fucker had tortured his little brother. Destroyed who he was and replaced him with a mindless being, alive only to serve._

_It took every ounce of self-control he had to not gut the bastard right here and now. As much as he wanted to, the thou shall not kill rule that had been hardwired into his brain since childhood grappled with him and held him back._

_But Sionis had hurt Jason. Broken him, used him, allowed others to use him like Jason was his personal property to loan out._

_" Can't do it, can you, birdy?" Sionis mockingly asked, shifting ever so slightly against the escrima stick._

_" Shut up." Dick growled again, more guttural this time. It came from a dark chasm in his chest, so cold and rage filled that it threatened to topple every one of his beliefs just for the sweet, savoury tingle of revenge on his tongue._

_Sionis didn't stop there when he should have. His shattered arm and the situation he no longer had the reigns to weren't enough to intimidate him._

_He hardly showed signs of the pain._

_" Can't kill me even after all I did to your darling little Jason? I've lost count of all I've had a dick in that worthless bitch. The slut loves it. Maybe now that the Bat has him, he can finally put Jason to the only use he's ever been. A whore."_

_Dick brought his knee up and slammed it into Sionis' gut, drawing a sharp gasp of pain. He did it again and again for every vulgarity Sionis dared to call Jason. Two for worthless bitch, one for slut, one for whore._

_When he finally stopped he had Sionis coughing hard but it did nought to console Dick._

_" Gonna shut the fuck up now, Mask?!" He demanded and it came out louder than he intended, he ended up screaming the sentence._

_" Or I swear, I'm not going to pay a damn ounce of attention to the no-kill rule!" And Dick meant that. Every word. God knew how he meant that._

_Sionis gave a pained chuckle made to sound out of breath and gurgly by the blood in his mouth. That was the thing about Black Mask, the fatal flaw, he could never cut his losses in the face of defeat. He always needed to have the last word in._

_" Excuse me for not believing you, pretty bird, when didn't you make a promise to Jason? Wasn't it that everything be okay? And that was right before half of Gotham had their way with him. You should have heard the way he screamed when Bane-"_

_Dick never allowed his to finish that sentence, the words never left his mouth before the escrima stick to his larynx was propelled up with such force that the easily breakable bones of his jaw never stood a chance._

_What emanated was a sound too twisted and sickening for this world. A jarring wet snap, blood exploding through the zippered mouth, an actual scream of pain._

_It was the finest sound Dick had heard all night._

_The mask protected Sionis from the escrima stick travelling through the soft skin of his jaw and straight into his damn skull like Dick wanted it to, but it certainly still did its damage._

_" You're gonna regret," Dick began with a foreboding sinister undertone as he wrenched Sionis harder against the limo and for once. The bastard wasn't sneering with his broken jaw. His breath was stunted with the considerable pain and his muscles drawn taut, finally realising he was not in control here. That his fate was entirely up to what Dick decided._

_How fitting that he should find himself in a position so akin to what the last year of Jason's life had been._

_" Everything you did. Every single fucking time you ever laid a hand on my brother, you'll bleed for. Every time you hurt him, you'll bleed for. And guess what? Batman isn't here to stop me." Dick brought his face an inch from the surface of the mask and could feel Sionis harsh breathing through it and fuck, did he crave to see the what was in the man's eyes right now._

_Pain for sure. Fear, he hoped. But he knew better than that._

_Voice marred and thick with the spearing fire from his broken jaw, Sionis spat out something that bore a vague similarity to " Do your worst, boy wonder."_

_The last was supposed to diminish his authority but Dick didn't care. He intended to do nothing short of his worst._

 

_It could and well might have been, hours before Dick found himself arriving back at the stage in the warehouse where they had done all that sick shit to Jason. Except for the lack of anyone around, his family and the rogues alike, nothing had changed. The tools, hammer, crowbar, pliers, fucking hairdye can, all were scattered across the floor, turning brown with the vast quantities of blood finally beginning to dry._

_Finally._

_Dick wondered where Tim and Damian were but only half-heartedly. After the adrenaline rush began to pass him by, Dick was caught between two thick slices of shock and deep-rooted regret._

_Regret that despite promising Jason, swearing on his life that Sionis would never hurt him again, Sionis recaptured him and allowed the whole of the rogues gallery to take their grudges out on him._

_Dick knew this couldn't end with Black Mask. Not at all. Two-Face, Bane, Joker, they all played a part in this. Bruce was going to track each and every last one down, but they'd get off with a few broken bones and a month or two at most at either Blackgate or Arkham._

_Meanwhile, Jason was going to have those scars and traumas for the rest of his life. Have whore scrawled across his back and his fingers cut off for good._

_In Dick's opinion, those human stains deserved a little bit more than incarceration and a slap on the wrist from the Bat._

_While he planned what he would do, Dick's eyes travelled across the floor, studying, in turn, every tool and making a mental note of it, but stopped when he spied something in the far corner._

_A tripod, a camera, and the camera was on and taping._

_The fuck? Did those fuckers really film what they did to Jason? Of course they would have. Why wouldn't they want to eternalise the sick shit they did?_

_Dick's lips were pulled into a thin line and grimly he approached it, leaving bootprints of red behind as he carefully tried to step around what seemed like entire lakes of Jason's blood. But he couldn't avoid what was most of the ground at this point._

_He passed scuffed bloody handprints pressed into the ground and dreaded to think what had happened there, but by the dried white/pink substances anyone who had had sex could identify, it was obvious._

_Dick's jaw set and he seethed more. Those disgusting bastards were going to regret this for every day he would allow them to live._

_He picked the camera from the tripod and switched it off for later examination. He didn't want to see what was on there and he knew it, but it was the only way he could find out exactly who hurt his little brother and how._

_Call it karma, eye for an eye, or just plain revenge. Whatever it was, Dick planned in dishing it out in large helpings._

_Because they weren't - they absolutely weren't getting away with this._

_Beside the tripod, discarded and forgotten, lay Red Hood's most iconic feature; his cherry red helmet._

_Jason had been wearing it, Dick recalled, in the footage Sionis sent the press. And now it was here. Here where no one would notice it_

_Dick stared at it long and hard_.

 

* * *

 

 " _Dick_. What did you do?" Bruce demanded again, this time with more throttle to the question and subsequently snapped Dick out of his mental wanderings.

" Nothing." Dick finally replied, lifting his gaze and meeting Bruce's without allowing his emotions to betray him. He hid the rage that engulfed him with justifiable anger. Understating, justifiable anger.

" I didn't kill anyone. I dropped my escrima stick on the stage when I went to stop Jason from killing himself." He lifted it to show Bruce the lumps of clotted blood and few shards of bone. He turned it to give him a full examination.

" This is his blood, _mostly_."

Bruce's eyes attenuated in suspicion that wasn't misplaced. " And the rest?"

" Black Mask's." Dick told him truthfully. " He was going to shoot Jay and I.... I broke his arm." That part at least was the truth.

" Is that all you did?" It sounded like Bruce was trying so hard not to ask the elephant in the room question, _'did you kill him?'_

Knowing what he was resisting the urge to ask, Dick responded,

" I didn't kill him, Bruce. I left you and Little Wing to go after him, but he was gone by the time I got there. If he's smart, he skipped town." Dick lowered his escrima stick and left it hanging back by his side, feeling Bruce's heavy, relentless gaze bearing down on him.

The man could burn holes in people with his eyes much faster than Superman could. And it hurt more too.

" I don't think we're going to hear from him for a while." Dick carried on. " He's going to get away with everything he did to Jason."

" No." Bruce muttered, voice dropping to a dark timbre thick with intention. " He's going to pay for this."

 _With a month in Blackgate_ , Dick thought when Bruce carried on.

" But we can't go after him now-"

_Of course we can't._

" - Not while Jason is like this. We need to stay with him until we know more about his condition."

" I think we know plenty," Dick's eyes had narrowed to him looking through his lashes up at Bruce. His arms were folded over the blue V running from his chest to both his arms.

" They _tortured_ him, Bruce, they _raped_ him, they took out _all_ of their grudges on him. Oh, and let's not forget he's been Black Mask's personal sex toy for the past god knows how long."

Bruce had stiffened and hardened his lip with the 'rape' and 'grudges' part but when it came to the last, he put up his hand to silence his understandably rage-filled son.

" Stop it, Dick. I know you're angry-"

Dick didn't listen. Arms spread apart at his sides, he continued.

" Are really we not going to acknowledge everything they did to Jason? Ignore that they burned the skin off his back, smashed his bones, cut his fingers off-"

" _Stop_." Bruce repeated more forcefully and Dick caught a glimpse in his black eyes of just how much lust for vengeance he had in him. How much he wanted to pull apart each and every villain who had been there.

But he would never break his golden rule.

Not even for Jason, and he'd proven that before.

" We're not ignoring everything they did, but we need to take this one problem at a time, okay? One at a time." Bruce finished with dragging his hands through his cropped dark hair, dishevelled by sweat and the hours of anxious waiting.

They were wallowing in the unnamable number of crippling concerns for Jason and the knowledge that felt like a noose around their necks; they had no idea where to start fixing him.

Before their conversation could go further, a very exhausted looking Leslie Thompkins appeared from around the corner. Her greying hair was made fuzzy by strands escaping her bun and beads of cold sweat were drying on her brow. She looked ready to pass out as she pulled off her latex gloves by the fingers. There was blood on the front of her surgical apron.

Her worn out condition wasn't surprising, given how she had spent near to six hours treating Jason's most urgent injuries. And there were many still left to tend to.

" Leslie, how is he?" Bruce demanded before she'd so much as arrived.

" Is he okay?" Dick didn't wait to give her the chance to reply to the first question. And of course, he knew Jason wasn't going to be okay for a very long time to come.

Leslie halted in the middle of the hall, dragging the glove from over her hand with a sharp snap that rang clear through the otherwise silent waiting area. She took a shuddery breath.

" I stemmed the internal bleeding, reset his bones, disinfected lacerations, treated the burns, and managed to pump out the blood that was filling his chest cavity. It was pressing on his collapsed lung, which is why he couldn't breathe."

 _Obviously_.

Leslie finished with,

" He's stable. For now."

" Where is he?" Bruce asked, his face the embodiment of so many uncharted feelings. Worry, fear, need, want, _regret_.

Dick watched him from the corner of his vision. He rarely saw Bruce like this and no one could deny how much he ached for Jason.

His very soul seemed to bleed.

But he still wouldn't kill Sionis.

" He's in ICU. You can see him for a few minutes, if you like."

As if Leslie even needed to ask. They both followed her without a word as she began to lead the way back down the hall, gesturing for them to follow.

While they walked, she explained more,

" He has fourth-degree burns over twenty percent of his body. Jason will need skin grafts. Eight ribs were broken, two fractured. Fractured leg, arm, pelvis, dislocated shoulder, bruised liver as well as other organs, a hairline fractures on his skull, grade three concussion. Left hand, broken. Three fingers missing." Leslie paused to take a breath and Bruce bore a grim expression through her listing the numerous injuries Jason had suffered, while Dick, disturbingly enough, looked tranquil as the sea before a hurricane while he listened.

" And this," Leslie reached into the pocket of her hospital scrubs and pulled out a tiny device, no bigger than a grain of rice, and attached to it was a thin half-inch wire.

Bruce took it and examined it. He and Dick both recognised it instantly.

" It's a wiretap," Dick observed.

Leslie eyed him warily. " There were fifteen of those _wiretaps_ in him, just beneath his skin. I ran an X-ray and it appears there's one behind his eye, too. I can't remove it, I need a specialist but as far as I can tell, it's not causing Jason any immediate harm."

Dick drew his lips into a fine thin line, scowling at the ground.

" This - what Mask has done, it's fucking disgusting."

Bruce didn't say anything in agreement but Dick knew he was of a like mind.

Leslie took them into a hospital room that was somewhat detached from the area that was busier during the day. That was smart. It would keep Jason from freaking out every time a stranger passed. And more importantly, no one could recognise him.

As they stepped in, Dick and Bruce were greeted by the sight of Jason, unconscious from one drug or another, and laid out on the bed. An IV and catheters were attached to him and a breathing tube was down his throat. His torso would be bare and exposed, were it not for the mess of crisscrossing bandages and gauze with red stains beneath. Both his hands were wrapped up too.

His skin was blotchy, black and blue from bruises and reddish from countless stitched shut cuts that ran deep.

All in all, Jason looked like hell.

But he was alive.

Externally at least. As far as Dick could tell, their Jason wasn't in there anymore and what was left was an empty husk. Not really human at all.

Bruce stared at him, stared at his son. It seemed to be all he could do while the umpteenth wave of shock passed. It was as if seeing him again was truly what broke the Bat's back.

" He'll need many more operations," Leslie said, gesturing to Jason with a weary wave of her hand.

" But he's okay for a little while. _Physically_."

" Thanks, Leslie." Dick murmured because Bruce wasn't responding. Leslie nodded and quietly turned to leave, reminding them over her shoulder to stay for only a few moments and no more.

Minutes passed before Dick turned to Bruce, the whirr of the machines and Jason's artificial breathing the only sounds.

" Now what?"

Lowering his head, Bruce shook it in hopelessness. With a deep shuddery sigh he closed his eyes.

" I don't know."

 

* * *

 

   
Minutes turned to hours turned to a molten mess of time Dick could no longer keep track of it. After a while, Leslie had given them the all clear to stay longer.

He was slumped over in the armchair next to Jason's bedside, resting his chin in his hands and staring through eyes glazed over with exhaustion at his brother.

Twenty hours and Jason hadn't woken up. Twenty hours and Bruce had only just left to grab a coffee. Twenty hours and they still had no goddamn idea if Jason was ever coming out of this comatose state.

Leslie had said that she couldn't guarantee he was going to wake up and awful as it sounded, Dick was half convinced it would be a mercy if he stayed like this forever.

He'd seen the aftermath of what the rogues did, he hadn't even dared to peek at the tapes yet, and he already knew recovery was pretty much impossible. There was only so much damage a person could take before there was no coming back.

And Jason was about a thousand miles past that limit.

Dick sighed and shifted his hands, watching Jason's bandaged chest gently rise and fall as a machine pushed air in and out of his lungs.

Until Jason awakes, their chances of finding Roy were low with no idea where Sionis was keeping him, and since the chances of being able to ask Jason were iffy at best...

Everything had been dipped in ruined, glazed with destroyed, had fucked up sprinkled over it and cooked with the fires of irrecoverableness.

That's what this situation was.

 _Irrecoverable_.

It was a strong word that Dick didn't use to believe in but he had since changed his mind on a lot of things.

Then he heard running down the hall, hard footfalls from more than one pair of feet. Dick wagered it would be Tim or Damian, maybe even Alfred, when to answer unsaid prayers to an uncaring God, Roy appeared in the doorway, out of breath, panting and visibly distressed.

Kori was on his heels, her brow furrowed with concern.

" Dick, where's Jason?" Roy urgently demanded before he saw Jason. His expression became horrified, lips parting and color draining from his skin.

Dick gaped. He couldn't help it. Where the fuck did Roy come from so suddenly? And what had happened to him? He was pale, sickly looking, bruised, letters were burned into his cheek and his damn arm was missing, just below the elbow. Cut off.

" R - _Roy_ ," Dick leapt up from his seat and to his feet and rushing across the room, but the archer pushed past him and headed to Jason.

" Is he okay?" Roy demanded, no care for his own obviously awful condition. He was standing over Jason, gaze darting up and down his wrecked body as if unsure where it was safe to land. As if even the weight of his gaze alone was enough to finish Jason off.

" Babe..." He whimpered. "Oh god. What did they do to him?" Breath small and intermittent, Roy's voice sounded like a pleading cry and he kept swaying. 

Dick exchanged a look with Kori, whose appearance suggested she was as worried as he himself was.

" I tried to make him see a doctor, Dick." she said like she needed to explain and justify.

Dick stepped towards the archer, hands raised.

" Roy, you need to sit down. You're not well." He said, taking Roy gently by his shoulders with the lightest touch he was capable of. The stricken, hurt and somehow lost bottle green eyes met Dick's and he realised then that they were all screwed up by this. Not just Jason.

" Is he okay, Dick? Please tell me." Roy begged, tears brimming as his body could do nothing to keep from trembling.

Dick stared at his friend, taking in the entirety of his poor condition before replying.

" Dr Thompkins says he's stable," that wasn't a lie, " but you need to sit."

" But Jason - he - Black Mask said he was dying an-" Roy kept stammering helplessly as Dick lead him to the chair he'd occupied not five minutes ago.

" He's alright, Roy, okay? Leslie is going to take good care of him." Dick took a knee with one hand still on Roy's quivering shoulder. Dick was aware of Kori's confused and helpless gaze tracking them before it returned to Jason.

Some ten minutes passed and Roy had steadied his breathing enough to explain to Dick what had happened, where he'd been, and that he managed to call the Titans for help.

He kept fidgeting with his balled up fist every word he spoke. Dick still couldn't believe Black Mask is had cut off Roy's arm then had Jason burn his initials into his face.

It drove the wedge of fury deeper into his heart.

" I - I went to the mansion," Roy said, fixated on his hand, " Lian was napping but she's okay. Alfred said you guys were at Dr Thompkins' clinic so I... Came here."

Dick hummed in understanding, nodding ever so slightly as he listened. Of course, Roy would put Lian's and Jason's wellbeing way above his own, hence why Kori had gone to find Leslie so she could check him over.

" Lian is okay." Dick said and Roy really didn't need to know about Jason trying to kill her just yet. Like Bruce had said, one problem at a time.

" We need to get you and Jay fixed up now, alright?" He pushed a small reassuring smile, the best he could manage but he knew it was no use.

" What did Sionis do to Jason, Dick?" Roy whispered the question like he really didn't want to know but at the same time, had to.

" It's better that we talk about it later, Roy. When you're feeling a bit better." Dick couldn't tell him the horrific finer details when he was like this, not when he himself could barely stomach it.

" No. No, I want to know, Dick." Roy pushed, much to Dick's dismay. He tried to stand but Dick's hands found his chest and gently pressed him back down against the backrest of the armchair.

" He hurt him. Badly." Dick said and that must have been the understatement of the century. What the rogues made Jason ensure went worlds past merely hurting him.

They destroyed him but Sionis is where it started. The rogues were only partly to blame.

For the most part, it was all Black Mask's fault.

" God, Dick," Roy buried his face in his hand, tears spilling as he could guess at least some of what Dick wasn't telling him.

" I tried to help him b - but-"

" I know," Dick soothed, pulling Roy into his arms and hugging him tightly. They both needed it right now. Just the touch that reminded them that life still existed and went beyond the anguish of today. But neither of them really believed it.

" We all tried to help him." Dick sniffed and stared ahead, his own vision becoming blurry.

" But there was nothing we could do."

" There still isn't." Roy mumbled into his chest, his face completely buried in it. Dick could feel warm liquid beginning to drench the front of his shirt. He didn't care.

And he knew more than full well that Roy was right and the faint yet deafening _bleep, bleep, bleep_ of Jason's vitals being measured by a machine seemed to drive that notion home harder.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The question on all of our minds, what did Dick do to Sionis?


	18. Chapter 18

 

There was no right way to wake up after what Jason fuzzily recalled falling asleep in the middle of... Actually, no. He didn't fall asleep, he was drugged. _Knocked out_.

Rephrased, there was no right way of waking up after what Jason fuzzily recalled being knocked out in the middle of, but without the hard plastic tube invading his mouth and feeling so rigid down his throat, it would have been a world less terrifying.

His eyes snapped open to complete and utter inky blankness where everything, _every_ single thing he felt was pain. Sheer and undiluted. It was ravaging his entire body like a wildfire over a lake of gasoline.

He woke up all at once, not gradually as he may have preferred. Choking, coughing, maybe _screaming_ , trying so hard to breathe around the damn tube but it was suffocating him. Panic ensured his vocal muscles constricted around it and worsened everything. Every desperate drag for air was transferred as knives scraping along the ridges of his windpipe.

" Jason, goddammit, don't pull it out!" Someone exclaimed from right next to him, so close and sudden it startled him. _Badly_. Then it seemed like he was surrounded by a nation of people screaming out his name and screaming out orders.

And hands. There were hands on him, grasping at him and trying to push him back down.

Jason used whatever measly strength he had to fight back at them but they're strong. Stronger than him. And solid.

" Babe, stoppit!" 

" Jay, calm down, you're okay." Someone much gentler coaxed. But he wasn't okay. He wasn't. Jason's bloody eyes wouldn't work enough to allow him to see where he was, but he knew it had to be the white room. The overpowering stench of antiseptic and medicine and the pain reverberating through him were all clear indicators to that.

Jason found a handful of the damn tube, wrapped around his burning fist, and right before he could yank it out two big, heavy pairs of hands landed on his shoulders and ignorant to what he wanted as he was used to, made him lie back down. Jason made some muffled noise. Something, fingers maybe, wrapped around his wrists and held them together so that Jason could feel his own racing pulse pressing against itself. It was a strong grip yet somehow gentle at the same time.

Jason kept gasping despite the thing filling up his throat, trying to breathe for him. But he didn't want it to. He just wanted the stupid tube out of him. It made everything hurt so much worse.

He whimpered in fear more than pain and next to him, there was the breathy murmur of whoever was holding him shushing him. The soft breaths they were exhaling scraped against Jason's skill like the rusted claws of an old rake.

It was _painful._

But he didn't dare utter anything when it occurred to him that this might be Sir.

" Shh. It's okay, son..." The voice was an aberration, distorted and muddled up but Jason could still make out that it was a man. A man with a strong, gravelly hint of authority to every word he spoke. 

Definitely Sir.

Jason relaxed a bit with that notion. Sir would never let him be put back into the white room. He would keep him safe.

" Everything is okay, Jason."

_Click, click, click._

_Clicking._

There was a sound Jason's disoriented mind took a moment to process before realising that it might be heeled shoes against the hard linoleum floor. They approached him.

" Can you give him more sedative, Leslie?" Sir asked, still holding fast onto Jason's wrists but one hand had moved to caress his hair and the side of his face. It wasn't what Sir usually did but maybe Jason's delirious state was fabricating the sensation. That was a likely possibility.

" Already on it." The woman said and soon Jason could feel the cold tingle of one drug or another filling his veins through what he assumed must be an IV, clinging to the inside of his elbow like a leech. 

" This will make you feel better, sweetheart." She said to him and Jason wasn't sure if that was the brush of her fingers he felt ghost across his cheek. With her gentle aged voice, she sounded sad. 

The drug took effect fast. Things, sounds, were beginning to blur and seem distant to Jason like he was falling down into a chasm. He groaned and his eyelids began to feel so heavy again. The pain was lessening again, or rather being covered up with a thick coat of sedatives.

But it still hurt _so_ much.

Jason found himself whining through the tube as he felt that he was going back under and the fingers in his hair kept stroking down the strands gently, carding through his locks to soothe him.

" It's okay, darling" Sir murmured, so faint and so quiet it was like he was a million miles away. There was something akin to strain when he spoke. 

" No one's going to hurt you."

*

When Jason came around again it was with his tongue taking up most residency in his mouth and not the horrible tube. 

Waking up this time around was much less abrupt and painful, like drifting towards the shores of consciousness instead of careering full force into the cliffs surrounding it. 

His sight was blotchy at first but unlike last time, it was there. When he could again somewhat see, blinking sluggishly up at the artificial lighting hanging above him, everything still seemed out of focus. A heavy dull ache buzzed around the furthest corners of his skull but Sir must really have had him under some heavy drugs because the sheer extent of scream-inducing agony he'd previously woken to was numbed.

His whole body felt numb and ill responsive to his commands to get up and find out where he was.

But he couldn't. Just keeping his eyes open a crack was harder than anything he had ever done. Breathing was another thing. The tube was gone and good riddance, but inhaling and exhaling were still artificial and less than pleasant. The more he came around, Jason realised there was a thin tube travelling into his side through his skin and between his ribs, no doubt stuck in his lung, hence the understated discomfort. 

But Jason was too doped up to care whether he was breathing for himself or not.

There was what appeared to be a hand over his bandaged one, lightly curled around it, and he gradually became aware that someone was sitting next to him, in the far corner of his sights. He could make out a mess of red. He tried to turn and see who it was but moving his head or anything else for that matter was a big no-no.

Jason groaned weakly, the sound near too soft to carry past his lips.

The person next to him jerked up and their movement caused Jason to realise the things weighing around his wrists. Restraints. Thick, wide, padded restraints that made sure his arms stayed by his sides. The soft jingling of small chain links attached to the metallic sides of the bed was all he heard for a sickening while.

He was cuffed.

Why was he _cuffed?_

What was Sir going to do?

The only thing that kept Jason from full-on panicking was the knowledge that Sir would never let Pyg put him back in the white room. Never. There was another reason he was tied down and whatever it may be, it was alright so long as it had nothing to do with that _room_.

Anything else, _anyone_ else, he could take.

" Dick, could you get Dr Thompkins?" The person asked and someone left the room. Their footfalls sounded so loud, each one hard as the beat of a war drum.

Jason winced, the bursts of sound careering through his head.

" Hey," came a soft-spoken greeting from closer to Jason than he'd noticed and blurrily, green eyes, red hair, and worry came into focus. 

He used to know the caress of that breath anywhere. 

... Roy... Jason slowly put together. It was Roy.

There was white padding over his cheek, the edges of the medical tape holding it there crinkling. It was disguising what Jason did to his face with the red hot iron. He felt a tiny tug of guilt somewhere in him but it was made slightly better by the fact that Jason knew it he'd done the right thing for Roy.

He hoped Roy would come to see it that way but at that moment, he didn't seem angry at all like Jason had expected. Maybe he would be later but not now.

Maybe he didn't yet realise his face was ruined for good?

When he did realise that, Jason knew he was in for hell with the crowbar again, or maybe the noose, but until then he had to try not annoy Roy more.

Jason tried to say something but his tongue felt too heavy and his throat too dry. Scratchy. Harsh. Whatever sound he managed to get out wasn't bearing any similarity to spoken language and was more of an animalistic croak. 

" Shh. Don't try to speak, babe." Roy told him, more like advised. Or was that an order? Jason really couldn't tell. 

Fuck, his head throbbed like hell. 

" You had me scared there." Roy continued quietly like he'd mean to keep that to himself.

He curled his fingers into a loose fist and Jason was halfway between deciding if he should just stare at him vacantly and brace for a hit, but he didn't need to make that choice when Roy did nought but lightly brush his knuckles down the side of Jason's cheek, as if needing to reaffirm with himself that this wasn't a delusion brought on by wishful thinking.

This was real.

Jason couldn't help but wonder if he wished it wasn't so.

Roy never understood the sheer importance of fulfilling Sir's commands so this whole thing might seem pointless to him.

Jason made a mental note to later make sure Roy knew exactly why Sir getting what he wanted was on par with breathing as far as importance went.

Because he had to understand. Later.

 

_" W.. Where?"_ Jason tried to say but it didn't sound the way he wanted it to. What came out of his mouth bore more resemblance to a dry gasp than a word.

But Roy seemed to understand.

" We're at Leslie's clinic, babe," Jason didn't remember who that was, " she's going to make you better."

Roy was patient and calm as he explained but there was a large unmissable quantity of something heavy weighing on his voice. Sadness? Worry? _Exhaustion_. Some relief was there also but mostly those first three.

" S... _Ss_ _s_.." Jason had wanted to ask what to him was the most important question here, where was Sir? When three people entered the room and Roy's attention snapped to them. He turned his head to look but Jason could only make them out once they came into his peripheral view.

One he vaguely recognised as Nightwing... Whose name was... _Dick?_ He wasn't sure he knew who the woman was, but the third, the one he sure as hell recognised, stabbed daggers of terror and dread straight through his heart.

Even without his mask, Jason knew _that_ was Batman.

_Batman._

_Fucking Batman._

" Jason-" he started.

The second Batman looked his way, Jason jerked his wrists up hard against the restraints holding firm, his entire being going tense before the sounds of the cuffs colliding with the metal bed rails had even run out through the sterilized room.

" No.. no..." He found himself mumbling as four pairs of varicoloured eyes ranging from green to black locked on him, all wide and confused.

Why couldn't they understand that Batman was here to hurt him?

Why wasn't that obvious? They'd seen the wounds all over him, hadn't they?

Well who the hell did they think had caused them?!

" Jason?" Someone inquired with worry but Jason didn't register who it was. It may have been Roy however.

Jason's already too quick breath hitched when Batman came closer and the edges of the cuffs were beginning to bruise his wrists the more he pulled. He hissed in pain when the tube in his side received a nudge brought on by his movements.

" Babe, its okay." Roy tried to reassure him but he was blatantly lying and he must have known that. 

Jason's head snapped to him and his eyes were wide and glistening fear. But he knew he could trust Roy. He and Sir were the only people he could say that about and truly believe it. Yes, Roy had hurt him, but that was okay. Sir had hurt him too.

" Pl-please don't l-let him ne-near me, R-Roy. _Please_ " He whisper-pleaded, lips quivering so much that stringing the sentence together was more arduous than it had ever been.

Roy's brow scrunched up like he didn't understand.

" What? Jay, no one's here to hurt you. You're safe."

That last part barely made it into Jason's registry before he realised how close everyone suddenly was, but above everyone, how close _he_ was, looking at Jason the way he had then, like he was a feast on full display.

Just right for picking at.

Another yank of his arms and this time it was harder, jarring every fracture in his bones but that to him was less relevant to getting away from Batman. He grit his teeth and jerked at the restraints what little he could, kicking back the covers.

He didn't feel drowsy or numb anymore, the drug's effects suddenly faded and all he could process was that Batman was getting closer.

" D-don't c -  come near m - me-" He stammered, stumbling through his vocabulary.

" Jason, son," he tried, extending an open hand that Jason flinched away from like it was an open fire. Maybe it was. He could feel the hot rush of it spreading across his skin.

Actually, _everything_ felt like it was fucking aflame. The worst of it centred around his back. 

_Jayzus_ , every movement he made him half believe someone was stabbing him with tiny daggers.

But that was nothing compared to what he would feel if Batman so much as touched him.

The woman said something to the dark figure now looming over Jason, perhaps urging him to back off, but Batman didn't budge. He stared at Jason with an expression Jason couldn't name.

Wait. Was that... _Anguish?_ No. Couldn't be. 

" Jason, please, it's me," It sounded little short of a plead. Batman raised his hands and Jason tensed for the inevitable moment those would come down in him.

" I'm not going to hurt you." He insisted but instead of hearing that, Jason's distorted mind sprang up something completely different altogether.

_" Uncle J's not gonna hurt you - but Batman might."_

It was so near and real that Jason could have sworn he was in the warehouse again with his back against the wall, helplessly trapped.

" No." Jason whined and pulled harder, his panic becoming a tidal wave that quickly swept him under.

" _No_." He repeated and by now he was popping stitches in his futile efforts. 

" Jason, sweetheart, you're alright." The woman said and at that moment she sounded like a worried mother. 

" You're safe."

Fucking _liar_.

Even if Jason had believed a word of that, it couldn't have gotten through how scared he was.

The chains clanked loudly and the bed itself shook in the throes of his thrashing. Batman had backed away, he _thinks_ , and Dick and Roy were trying to keep him down without hurting him.

A task easier said than done.

" No! No, please, Roy-" their gazes interlocked through the haze of struggling, " please d - don't let him n - n - near m - me!" 

" Babe-" Jason threw himself back against the surface of the bed before Roy could say what he'd tried to.

Someone's arm, Dick's maybe, landed across his shoulders and his face was an inch away. Jason could feel unsteady his breath intertwining with his own frantic one. Dick's hand found his wrist and he was pinned down _again_. 

They were on top of him, he couldn't move, couldn't get away or even breathe-

" Little Wing, no one's gonna hurt-"

_" I won't let Sionis or anyone hurt you, Little Wing. Promise."_

"- _you_!" 

The woman was on his left side, fumbling to get the point of the filled syringe into the plug of the IV and Jason knew, he just _knew_ what was in it had to be hallucinogens. He couldn't let them put him back under those damn drugs.

Writhing, Jason wrenched his arm out of her reach and ended up _ripping_ the IV clean out of himself. It hurt a lot more than he'd estimated.

She gasped, he screamed, someone yelled something, and the bedsheets were getting awfully bloody by now.

Dick pushed him down more firmly, arm still across his shoulders.

Whimpering, Jason's chest heaved and the more he tried to get air into his lungs, the less he achieved. Full force, they were both crushing him. Roy was barely touching him with his one hand that tried to keep Jason looking at him and still he could feel the entire weight of his body holding him still.

God, why were they doing this? Why were they keeping him here for Batman to play with?

" Jason, babe," the anxious voice belonging to Roy was forced to sound calming when it broke through the walls of Jason's delusions. Suddenly, those emerald like eyes was all that Jason wanted to focus on.

He was panting like a fish on dry land, tears streaming down his cheeks and everything about him a dishevelled mess. The pain made him want to scream but still, he tried to make Roy the only thing he saw. It was the only way Batman couldn't pick his head apart a second time.

" You're safe." Roy assured him and there was something sincere to him saying that. Jason almost believed him. He sounded so certain.

" I'm not going to let anyone hurt you, okay? I'm never going to let anyone hurt you ever again."

Half on top of him, Dick shifted.

Shuddering, Jason tried to say something, something like 'okay' even if he knew Roy was lying, when something started to trail down his midriff. Hooked fingers. A hand. Dick's hand was there and it was pressing down on him.

_"_ _You were a weird lookin' kid but my god, you certainly grew up to be pretty."_

_" No!"_ Jason threw himself up with all his strength and that might have been his shoulder he felt dislocating from its god-intended place when his face collided with Dick's. Pain, sudden, reverberated throughout the front of his skull and _blood_ , there was blood but he knew it wasn't his.

Dick yelped as his head snapped back, leaving a red trail of liquid to fly through the air momentarily in what seemed like slow motion before he crashed backwards and straight into arms there to catch him.

 _Batman's_ arms.

Jason couldn't hear anything over his frantic breathing anymore, nothing above his soaring heartbeat, nothing except-

" Jason, _drowse_ -!"

And then with that one word, everything fell to blackness again and Jason's head slumped lifelessly against his shoulder.

 

 

 

Breathing heavily in and out, Roy stared down at Jason. _Jason_ who he had rendered unconscious once again with the use of the word he'd heard Sionis say a few times during his captivity.

Leslie was fumbling with the various machines that all seemed to be emitting a high pitched wail after Jason disconnected so many wires and tubes during his manic struggling and Bruce was pulling Dick back up onto his feet and checking if he was okay.

His lip was split bad and spewing blood down the front of his pale blue tee.

But close to none of that made it to the registry with Roy when all he could do was be fixated in a mixture of horror and loss by what he'd just done.

Horror because he'd had to resort to those godawful trigger words Sionis had remoulded Jason into responding to, just stop Jason from hurting himself or anyone else worse than he already had.

And loss because this truly drove home the point that he was never getting his Jason back. His Jaybird. The very one that fucking monster Black Mask murdered with all of his sick games.

No. Not games. _Riddler_ played games, _Joker_ played games. What this was was meticulous, precise, pre-planned, and all to strike Batman a hard blow.

It caused rage to stir in his chest.

Roy wanted to scream and rip out clumps of his hair because this wasn't fucking personal. None of this had ever been about Jason and Black Mask. Sure Sionis liked Jason as a plaything, but in the long run, the grand scheme of things, this had all been about the war between Black Mask and the Dark Knight.

Like two rabid hounds fighting over a chew toy.

With a last glance towards Jason through a blurry haze of tears and anger, Roy turned on his heel and stormed from the room, the soles of his boots squeaking against the smooth floor the faster he walked.

He couldn't stay there another minute straight to add to the hours he'd sat by Jason, unable to help him.

Roy really needed a breath of fucking fresh air right now.

" Roy!" Anxious or some shit like that, Dick ran after and by the heavy and slower footfalls behind him, Bruce was on his heels.

Fucking great.

" Roy, _wait_."

Roy snapped back around to face him and Dick hadn't even wiped the blood from his mouth before pursuing him down the clinic's halls. Bruce stalled a meter behind and just stood there like a damn statue with a frown dominating its face.

" I'm really not in the mood for whatever you're about to say, Dick." Roy spat and that was the only warning he intended to give before he completely lost his cool with them. He hardly realised the single warm tear sliding down his cheek with a damp trail in its wake.

" Just listen to me, Roy," Dick urged and the blood on his teeth showed. " You-"

" No, Dick," Roy cut him off mid-sentence and he did it without honeying his tone.

" I'm done listening to you and listening to _him_." Roy's glare fleetingly fixed over Dick's shoulder and on Bruce returning back to his _friend_.

" I know you're angry, R-" Dick tried again but with no more success.

" Angry?" He scoffed sarcastically. " You don't know the _half_ of it. I'm fucking furious. We all keep saying this was Black Mask. Black Mask did this but _no!"_

He didn't notice he was yelling by now, one fist clenched and the phantom hand of his amputated arm joining in. He didn't care how shocked Dick looked, how Bruce would do nothing but frown at him, or how the whole damn clinic was staring.

" You and you-" he gestured to Bruce and Dick with a too fast wave of his hand.

" Are equally to fucking blame."

" I'd stop right there, Roy." Bruce's low foreboding growl was the first thing he'd said in the midst of the argument and he stepped past Dick to tower of Roy with all his 6'3 feet of height.

Meant to intimidate him into silence, Roy bet and maybe it had worked for him before but not today.

" Don't fucking deny it, Wayne. You know as well as I do that if you cared enough about Jason to check on him in person just once during that year he was undercover with Gotham's criminal kingpin, he wouldn't be fucking like this."

No response from Bruce. No justification or attempt to defend himself. Just that same damn glare Roy didn't acknowledge before turning the finger of blame on Dick.

" And you - _you_ should never have let Jason anywhere near Sionis after you found him!"

" He wanted to save you. He wanted to do it." Dick feebly argued back and he was moments from tearing up because he knew every fucking word was the truth. On his part, at least.

" Why did you let him make that goddamn decision? Wasn't it obvious he was in no condition to fucking think for himself?! Wasn't it?!" Roy's face had gone red like a tomato or red like his hair and everything he half screamed, half shouted at them came from the heart.

Sionis wasn't the only one who could be chalked up to this.

" Because I fucked up, Roy!" Dick finally broke like a landmine pressured just a tad too much. That bottled up rage, sadness, and regret was spilling out of his eyes.

" I know I did! Is that what you want to hear?" He continued like this was absolutely something he had to get off his chest. How long had he been mulling over this self-blame?

" But let's not pretend like none of this is Jason's fault! We keep making him out to be this innocent victim when he's not!"

Roy's eyes narrowed and his teeth ground together, muscles stiffening because _now_ Dick was going too far.

" Don't you _dare_ bloody blame him for this, Grayson."

" I'm not blaming him but he sure as hell contributed. He could have reached out to us to help him months before it ever got this bad, but he didn't, because he's that damn stubborn."

" _Stubborn_?" Roy snorted and spun back around to face Bruce, who stood ever wordless while they got all this out their system. But it was far from out.

" More like _scared_. He never told any one of us about what Sionis was doing to him because he was afraid we would blame him for _messing up_." Roy gestured to their surroundings, one arm spreading outward while the remainder of the other could only flail at his side like a useless wing.

" And look how right he was!"

" And why," Bruce began like the few patients and fewer hospital staff members weren't staring at the conflict unravel. His gaze was dark as the river Styx and his face even more so. Roy had crossed a line and he knew it.

And he also didn't care.

" Do you suppose Jason was afraid to tell _you?"_

For a moment Roy felt like he'd been slapped and bore the expression to go with it before he regained himself and scowled with more loathing in his heart than he'd ever felt. Other than every time he thought about Sionis.

" I'm going to go to your mansion," he started too slowly, voice that of a viper's before springing to bite. " And I'm going to collect my daughter and I'm going to take her home. But before I go do that, I want to leave you with this one final notion,"

There was a silence in which a pin falling on the other side of the city would have sounded deafening. Roy could feel Dick tense and hear him draw his breath back.

" Jason, the love of my life and your _son_ was, tortured for months because he thought failing his mission would disappoint you. And he _never_ wanted to disappoint _you_."

With those final words, he knew struck a wrong chord hard enough to sting, Roy left. He didn't care where Kori had sauntered off to or that he may have just ruined his lifelong friendship with Dick.

All he cared about was his daughter traumatized, his boyfriend was an empty husk of himself, his mentor was hospitalised, and there were too many people to blame for him to keep track of.

But he knew he was one of them.

They each were.

Fuck, he really needed to see Lian right now and get out of this hospital scene for an hour.

 

 

 

 

Roy's hard and fast-paced footsteps fading, Bruce saw Dick turn ever so slightly from the corner of his eye. He saw the tears glittering like stars against his dark lashes, both beautiful and ugly at once. Such couldn't be said, however, for the deltas cascading down his flushed cheeks. He was over emotional from days with no sleep and this hit him hard.

His fists were opening and closing methodically and Bruce knew Dick was filled with as much self-blame as he himself was.

" He's right, isn't he, Bruce?" Dick asked and sounded like he needed within every inch of his soul for Bruce to deny it.

But that would be a blatant lie.

" Go back to Leslie, Dick. See if she needs help." He instructed/ordered in place of giving his son any form of solace in the face of what was inarguably the most difficult thing they had yet faced.

Because kevlar could protect the heart from bullets and knives, but not an attack like this. Not an attack that left one of his children not broken, but _shattered_.

Bruce heard Dick leave and knew he should have said something after him, instead he stared at the floor like the answers of the universe just opened up before him.

Roy wasn't wrong, he hated to admit. Roy wasn't wrong about him never paying close enough attention to what was happening to Jason while at Sionis' side.

But it wasn't for lack of caring like the now one-armed archer had accused him of. It was something else entirely that drove the wedge of distance between him and his son.

But none of that meant a damn right now because dwelling on what could have been wasn't going to bring Jason back or make him any less convinced that Bruce was going to hurt him.

That _Batman_ was going to hurt him.

Out of all the things Sionis could have weaponized that was the worst. Making Jason believe that Bruce had done all this sick shit to him and would do it again at any given chance.

But in a way, he guessed he had done this. Or at least played a major role in it. After all, wasn't he the one who sent Jason undercover in the first place?

And Jason always stayed so quiet about the true nature of his predicament. He never uttered so much as a plea for help when he was drowning because like Roy had said, he didn't want Bruce to be _disappointed_.

With the staggering weight of Roy's truthful arguments resting heavily on his shoulders, Bruce stayed  in the near empty hallway, staring at the ground while his fists tightened until his fingernails dug into his palms.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As you guys can probably tell, this story is winding down to the finale with just a few more chapters to go. I was planning on writing a sequel at some point with more recovery and drama and such in it, but we'll see if that evolves into more than just planning.


	19. Chapter 19

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *Swims to the surface of the sea after spending weeks at the bottom of the Mariana Trench and finally has the WiFi to update with*

It got worse.

Much _worse_.

Jason went hysterical any time someone so much as mentioned bat and man eight sentences apart and most days, he didn't trust even Roy. Half the time he was pleading with him to stay away and the other to please keep Batman away from him.

Jason had become inconsistent like that. With no warning or apparent trigger,  who he felt he could trust changed until every moment was a gamble whether or not a sideways glance would set him off.

The only person he continuously feared was Bruce.

But Jason kept trying to escape and find his... _'Sir'_ , who they all knew by now, was Sionis.

It was fucking disgusting and Dick was halfway sure he should spill that even if Jason managed to get loose, he wouldn't be finding his precious Sir, no matter how hard he looked. At least that would stop him fussing over the bastard.

In one incident, Jason managed to get his arms free from the cuffs and almost stabbed Leslie with a scalpel he found because she tried to stop him leaving. That's how fucking desperate be was to find his Sir.

After that disaster, Bruce and Leslie alike reached the conclusion that Jason was a danger to himself and everyone around him, and that moving him to the mansion was the safest option for everyone. That way, fewer people were at risk.

Roy, Dick, Babs, everyone visited him as often as his moods allowed. Except for Bruce, he only came when Jason was asleep or knocked out to avoid sending him into hysterics. 

If they ever thought his condition was bad before, it only worsened by the day. His health wasn't getting any better either, wounds were barely healing and it was regular for him to black out for no apparent reason.

There were so many problems that that seemed to be the least of them. Bruce and Leslie chalked it up to severe dissociation.

Roy and Dick, though still not getting along, could both agree that was a steaming pile of crap.

*

" What if I sl - sleep with you?" Jason suggested one evening and Dick nearly choked on air. They were the only two people in this new room they'd brought him to and the sun was going down, and that made everything dark and shadowy. Pale fingers of fleeting light reached out towards him through the parted curtains over the window.

" _What?!"_ Dick gasped and looked horrified while he did.

His reaction puzzled Jason but he tried again nonetheless.

" If - if I sleep with y - you, will you - you let m - me go?"

" No, Jason!" Dick sprung up from his seat and Jason shied back against the bed in anticipation for the fist to his face. He hadn't been hit in quite some time and a dominating masochistic part of him missed the sheer intensity of such an intimate gesture as a punch.

" Good god, Jason! _No_!" Dick repeated and raked his fingers through his considerably lengthy hair, looking so frustrated Jason couldn't comprehend it.

" I don't want to sleep with you!"

Jason winced. He knew he wasn't as pretty after what the rogues did, but that was a bit harsh. It's not like Dick had to _look_ at Jason, after all. Just use him.

" B - but I can make i - it good." Jason insisted but by what he could tell, Dick wasn't convinced. Dammit. He needed to press more.

" I know I'm - I'm not b - best or even s - second best but - but I know how to make you li - like it."

That look on Dick's face. Jason knew that look. _Disgust_. Of course, he didn't believe what Jason told him. How could he when Jason was so ugly now? Sir had always said the scars made him ugly and that must be the universal opinion.

But more than the hideous marrings and puckered wounds held together with just stitches, Jason knew the other thing that brought about this rejection was that he was _used_. Used by so many men that he couldn't count. Why had he been so dumb to believe someone as pure and precious as Dick would want to fuck a disgusting slut like himself?

But what else could he trade if not his body? He'd tried the same offer with every one of the multitudes of faces who'd come through here from Roy to a red-headed woman in a wheelchair. She'd been nice, turned him down gently while the others reacted like Dick.

The only person he never once made the suggestion to was Batman because Jason knew if he wanted it, he would just take it like he took everything.

And Batman had come by less and less since they forced him to come to this _mansion_ a week ago. He did creak the door open when he thought Jason was asleep and gaze in and on one instance, he came close enough for Jason to feel the heat radiating off his body.

Jason had been sure of what he was there to do, but then Batman just left without ever touching him more than with the hand that brushed his cheek.

Jason didn't know what he was waiting for.

Jason watched in increasing nervousness as Dick paced the room like he had no clue what to say. It shouldn't have been so hard. It was a yes or no question Jason had presented, and he'd already said no. It was as if Jason was on the edge of a knife and he could only imagine what Dick was going to do.

Maybe hit him with an escrima stick for assuming Dick's intentions? That sounds nice actually. The familiar rush of pain was the one constant Jason missed. It was like an old friend whose comfort he longed for.

" 'M s - sorry." Jason mumbled, gaze downcast to study the casts, splints, and bandages and he knew it made his eyes look wrong somehow. He captured Dick's attention with the first word and that was good because he wasn't allowed to raise his voice.

" I - I thought.." He trailed off and let Dick assume the rest because what the hell had he been thinking? That Dick would _want_ to have sex with a dumb slut like him? Sir had told Jason that he only had value to him and that was true.

" You don't have to think that, Jason." Dick finally said and it sounded so gentle that the softness behind it hurt Jason worse than an escrima stick to the jaw.

" No one's going to do that to you, ever again."

 _Fuck_. So he was useless to them?

 _" The day I have no use for you, Jason,"_ Sir once said, " _I'll kill you."_

*

" He tried to kill you, Dick, Lian, Bruce, himself, _twice_. He gave away confidential info about Batman's operations to the press, thus hurling Batman into child abuse accusations and god knows what else. Oh, and burned Black Mask's initials into my face." Roy finished that by gesturing to the padding over his cheek with a wave of his hand while grim-faced, Oliver listened.

Oliver, still less than well after the gunshot, sat slightly slumped over on the edge of the couch with a mug of coffee in both hands before him. A sweatshirt hung around his torso, loose so as not to catch on or rub against the bandages across his middle. Yes, it was stupid he wasn't at the hospital anymore, but he wanted to help Roy what little he could. Well, Roy and Lian, Lian who was and would be for a long time to come, badly shaken up by the incident.

He couldn't really help physically but Roy sure as hell needed someone who talk to who wasn't flying the bat colours. It was exhausting visiting the mansion and having to be in the presence of people who he wasn't in the best terms with, namely Dick and Bruce. The argument they'd had at the clinic while spur from the heat of the moment, had had some truth to it. Yes, they all blamed one another and god knew if those accusations were true. They came from a place of hurt and small bits of truth.

" Jason isn't well, Roy." Oliver quietly said, raising his gaze from his drink to interlock with emerald green ones. They both knew that before he said it, of course.

" I know, Ol." Roy sighed, rubbing his eyelids. For a moment, his right arm went to perform the movement until he was reminded for the umpteenth time, that he didn't have it any longer. Damn Sionis. He bit his lip to hide his irritation over the lost limb, irritation being an understatement.

" And I don't know what I can do to help him. Some days he's scared to death of me for no reason, and others he wants me to protect him." Leaning against his shoulder, Lian slept with a quilt covering her. She was pale and looked exhausted, stirring in restless slumber and Roy took it as a hint to lower his voice.

" Just be there for him, Roy." Oliver said, wincing at the slight adjustment of his position that he made. He hissed through his teeth and Roy watched him, worried but the expression Oliver gave him told him not to ask if he was okay, which was pretty much half of their verbal exchanges over the past days.

" But he's scared, Oliver. Of me, Dick, Bruce, his entire family. He thinks we're all going to hurt him. The only person he wants is..." A bitter, disgusting taste filled Roy's mouth before he spoke the name. " _Sionis_. Who he refers to by Sir. That's who he loves in some Stockholm syndrome way, not me."

Oliver nodded with that never-ending grimace. " You have to understand, Roy, Sionis made Jason like that. He doesn't love Sionis, it's sheer fear what's between them. Not love. And Jason does still care about you and Lian. He went against Sionis' exact orders to assassinate Lian. He wouldn't have done that if he didn't." 

Roy pulled a face and his remaining arm instinctively fastened around his sleeping daughter at the mention of how close he'd come to losing her. " Don't remind me, Ol. This shit storm has so many fucking elements to it that I don't know where to start. Like, I want to be there for Jay, I want to fix him, I want him to be him again, but what about Lian? He tried to kill her, she saw you bleeding to death. She's going to be scared of him... _terrified_ , even. How's she going to feel that I'm spending any time with Jason after that? I can't explain the hows and whys to her."

" Don't tell her, Roy. Help when you can, if you can with Jason, but Lian needs to be your top priority and I know you already know that." 

Oliver was right, Roy had already agreed that with himself. He loved Jason so, _so_ much but his daughter had to come first. That's the way it had to be. He began drawing shapes into Lian's scalp with his index finger, tracing circles and squares.

" How's he doing anyway?" Oliver asked and Roy looked up slowly from caressing Lian's unruly and wavy locks of ginger hair. He sighed and felt like he was exhaling daggers.

" I went to see him the other day, and he freaked out..."

 

Jason was on edge. Roy had sensed it the minute he came in from the wary way his dead-looking teal eyes tracked his movements across the room to how his muscles involuntarily stiffened as if to brace for a blow. Jason's body was covered in casts and bandages, splints, stitches, and a tube going directly through the skin over his abdomen and into his stomach because he refused to eat.  He was paler than the sheets and by the look of it, he hadn't slept for days. Not naturally at least. His wrists were burden to thick padded restrains that secured his arms to the bedsides to keep him from hurting himself or anyone else. It was necessary. Very, _very_ necessary.

Roy sat heavily on the chair placed next to Jason and looked at him. Nothing else. Just looked. It drained the life out of him to see the lightning that used to dance in Jason's eyes reduced to less than a shell of itself, less than a shell of _himself_.  Neither of them spoke and Roy knew for Jason, that was because he was apprehensive as to whether or not he was allowed to open his mouth and say something. Anything.

Roy initiated because Jason wouldn't dare to.

" How're you feeling today, babe?"

" W - what do y - you w - want to he - hear?"Jason cautiously inquired and Roy breathed a small sigh that made Jason wince like he'd committed a sinful act with no penance.  

" The truth, Jason. I want to hear the truth." 

Jason sat still and quiet, chewing on his lip profusely until Roy was afraid he was drawing blood. He let the question go because quite obviously, Jason wasn't sure what was 'the truth'. His brain was too scrambled by Sionis to know what was what.

" You - your mark." Jason raised his hand awkwardly, middle and ring finger put out to gesture in the direction of Roy's cheek, right before his arm heavily fell back down after reaching the length the chain would allow. Roy twitched his jaw, cheek following the movement. He'd grown his beard out somewhat, in the hopes it would cover at least some of the brand burned beneath it. No longer did care that it made him bare a resemblance to Oliver. Sue him, he didn't want Black Mask's initials shining out of his face like a beacon if he could help it.

And that appeared to be causing Jason some level of displeasure.

" Yeah, I decided a beard would look hot on me." Roy smiled best he could and really, really hoped Jason would buy that. God knows why, but he was sure Jason wouldn't be happy with the real reason. Imagine the disgrace of _not_ desiring to have those two ugly letters burned into your flesh then on full display. Wasn't that a privilege to bear that name? Shouldn't Roy be so lucky?

Jason stared at him with a serious expression on his gaunt, pale face.

" You - you have to p - put it back, R - Roy."

" It's still there, babe. Don't worry."  He assured but Jason's expression betrayed that he wasn't so convinced. Roy even went as far as to part the wiry hairs of his bristly mockery of a real beard to show him the fact that the letters in fact, had not gone anywhere. Nor would they ever.

" You c - c - can't hide i - it, Ro - Roy." Jason persisted and was getting twitchy and distressed. He kept running his tongue fleetingly across his chapped lips, incapable of making the moisture stick. " I - if S - Sir does - _sn't_   s - see it, th - then he won't l - leave y - you al - _lone_."

The fuck did he mean by alone?

The frown on Roy's face was matched in his eyes, the question WHAT written in lines along the creases of his brow.

" What are you talking 'bout, babe?" 

" S - Sir li - like me 'cause 'm pr - pre -tty he - sa - says." Jason took a gasp for a deep breath midway to finishing the explanation. " D - _in't_ w - want you t - to b - b - be hi - his-"

Hard as it was to make head or tail out of Jason mindlessly stumbling through speech like a drunkard on a walk, it still clicked in Roy's head what he was trying so hard to explain. Sionis was proud that Jason, his pet, was as visually appealing as he was. He'd made that clear time over time over time and if Roy correctly understood what Jason was saying... then it was true he'd deliberately burned the brand into his face, made that choice by himself, to... protect him? Protect him from Sionis because Sionis wouldn't 'like' him if he wasn't pretty? 

It was twisted logic that hadn't worked, but he could now see what Jason had been thinking.

It made Roy feel sick, all of it. Jason had really believed he was helping and it was impossible to hold a grudge about it. He couldn't even find it within himself to feel a tinge of anger.

" Babe," Sighing, Roy leaned forward and reached out his hand over Jason's mutilated one, taking care not to squeeze it despite how much he longed to. 

" Sionis can't hurt me anymore, he can't hurt you, you understand?" He looked into Jason's eyes and he gave a small, quick nod, though Roy got the sense that he only did that to appease him. 

" Everything is gonna be okay, okay? We're going to take care of you, Jason." Roy couldn't add the last 'no one's going to hurt you' before it looked like something suddenly dawned on Jason like yesterday's sunrise. His fists clenched, the joints of his fingers cracking, and he twisted his wrists inward so that the edges of the cuffs left white marks in the soft undersides of his arms. Were it not for the padding, the cuffs would have opened his veins.

" Jason, stop." Roy said to him and Jason didn't, kept twisting his balled up hands towards himself and pulling on the restraints so his taut tendons showed stretched tight beneath his skin. His teeth were grit with an audible _click_ as they set. Jason wasn't angry, Roy could tell, was he scared? Why? Roy hadn't done anything that could frighten him so suddenly. He'd only said one goddamn sentence, for fuck's sake!

" H - hurt you, R -Roy. D - didn't wanna h - hurt y - you."  

" Sionis made you do that, babe." Roy said, rising from his seat as slowly as he could - he didn't want any sudden movements to scare Jason - and took one of his bound wrists, holding the trembling thing in place. The tremors transferred straight into Roy's body and he found it hard to keep still.

" _Didn't_. If S - Sir w - won't hurt y - you 'gain, th - then-"  Jason had tears in his eyes and he swallowed them back labourously and made himself shudder. " I hurt y - you f - for no re - _ason_." 

Oh fuck. Roy realised the colossal mistake in his earlier wording. He hadn't meant to twist Jason's thinking around to make it sound like it was needless to burn his face. It was, of course, but Jason couldn't take knowing that.

" No, baby," Roy tried to assure, " you saved me, okay? Sionis didn't hurt me." What a huge fucking lie but there was no part of him that felt like bringing up the whole getting mouth fucked thing in the middle of this. Probably wouldn't bring it up even after. If there was an 'after' when everything had turned into one timeless hell loop in repeat.

" S'not tr - true, R - Roy. S - Sir told m - me t - to hurt you. N - _never_ h - hurt m - me back."

" Wh..?" That's when Roy remember how those sessions where they'd been forced to torture one another had been consistent in the turns changing after each round. Jason, Roy, Jason, Roy, and the last one - where he'd gotten branded - had been the last session. There had been no what Jason must consider 'fairness' after, as in, Roy hadn't 'repaid' the pain.

" H - hurt me, Roy. Or it - s'not f - fair." Jason tried to make the sentence less shattered at the words, but it was a plead undisguised.

" No, Jason!" None of this was fair, no matter what Roy did. But the world wasn't fucking fair, was it? " Babe, it's okay. I won't hurt you, it won't fix anything. We need to fix this, okay?" Now it was him pleading because he so, so needed - _wanted_ \- Jason to just understand this if it was all he did. 

But no. Jason's trembling had turned violent like a malevolent force was quaking him in its clawed hands. His lower lip ran crimson that reached all the way to his teeth that had bitten into it, small dribbles of blood rolling down his chin. Something between whimpers and sobs were racing free from the confines of his mouth and his breathing was dragged back and forth. 

" N - not  f - fair. N - no reason-" He kept mumbling in chorus to himself, like they were the only two sentences he knew. Roy lifted his hand from around Jason's wrist and cupped his cheek, brushing back the strands of messy hair with his thumb. With the colour drained from his face, the freckles that used to blend right in with Jason's tan stuck out clear to see beneath his eyes and crossing the bridge of his nose.

" Babe, please, listen to me," Roy said as he could feel something heavy like salty liquid filled his gaze and blurring it. His heart was being ripped out and eaten by the state Jason was in. He could make out the stinging pain that rang in his ears with every artery that was torn loose from the beating organ in his chest.

" Everything Sionis did and made you do, it wasn't your fault." He wasn't entirely sure the former was correct, given how Dick had made a strong point he wouldn't admit it was, but this was what Jason needed right now in place of blame.

It was then, when trying to coax Jason to one mindstate or another, that Roy realised what he was doing and why he kept moving his jaw so much. Jason had slid his tongue in between the sharp points of his teeth without Roy's immediate awareness and-

_Snap!_

His jaws clamped shut before they could be stopped, sinking into the soft meat of the strip of muscle and slicing through small blood veins. 

" JASON!" 

There was an artery in the tongue, the lingual one, biting through it was the excellent means of causing yourself some serious harm, or 'making it fair' as Jason saw it. Because if Roy wouldn't then Jason sure as hell would make it fair.

Roy tried to wedge the point of his thumb between Jason's teeth, pry them open, but with one goddamn arm that wasn't working! Blood was beginning spill out his mouth and before those awful trigger words even ran through Roy's mind, he drew his hand back and slapped Jason across the face with a high, sharp crack of flesh-on-flesh. The shock of the blow was enough to stop what Jason was trying to do to himself, his head snapping to the side in the wake of the strike that plunged the whole room into silence.

Breath shuddering, Roy's palm stung, alive with small needles of pain,  but that couldn't distract from the sensation of sinking into a pit of suffocating mud when Jason, blinking a few times too many, turned back to Roy, red hand print already shining on the pale flesh of his cheek. There was a minimal of nameless emotion sparkling dully in his eyes.

" Oh - _my_ god, I'm so sorry, baby-!" Roy attempted to say and didn't even care how that was all he could have done from Jason seriously hurting himself, he had still hit him. Across the face. The way Sionis used to, so many times with Roy there to watch. The way you would hit a dog.  

Jason seemed to be trapped on a slowly processing screen, lost as to what his reaction should be. Blood dripped down both corners of his mouth, and it must have been more painful than the slap, but he was as if the incises in his tongue weren't even there.

" S - S - Sir u - used t - to h - hit 'm like that." Jason finally said, voice thick and marred by pain that appeared to worsen his already hopeless stammering. Roy wasn't sure what he was seeing on Jason's face, not pain, not sadness, fear, confusion, relief, the warmth of welcoming an old friend, but a perverted mess of all those. He'd never actually dwelled much on the idea that Jason may well and truly be twisted to insanity up until then. Broken badly, Roy had thought, not _crazy_. 

Not crazy?

" J - just l - like that." Jason continued as if in a far-off trance. 

" Jay, please, I didn't mean-"

" B - 'cause s - sometimes I d - _idn't_   listen f - fast 'nough or n - not s - submissive 'nough."

Oh good god. Roy was starting to see where exactly Jason was leading with this and he realised heavy and hard just how much worse he made everything. Hitting him with a crowbar, okay, hanging him by a winch cable, acceptable, but slapping him the way 'Sir' used to on a basis? Fucking heck, was Jason really going to revert back to thinking whatever the hell was going through his mind right now? That Roy = Sir? That whoever slaps him around wears the pants?   

" Jason, whatever you're thinking, stop it, please." Roy begged and saw no mercy from this next wave of oncoming madness. " Babe, please, stop. I'm not Sir, I won't hurt you again. I'm sorry, please-" The pathetic pleading he couldn't help was met with a look from Jason as cold and lifeless as the night he pushed that branding iron in Roy's face.

" No. You're not Sir." No stammering. No quiver between syllables. What was happening? " B- but you're n - not Roy." Ah, there is was again, in some sick, twisted way a welcome familiarity. 

Roy's heart dropped like a lead ballast into the deepest pits of his stomach and he felt the rhythmic beating of the organ freeze.

" Jason, baby," he tried with crippling dismay, " of course it's me."

" N - no." The more Jason spoke, the more he was pressing himself deeper against the surface of the bed. " R - Roy wouldn't u - use th - the words," _dammit,_ the _trigger_ words, " R - Roy w - wouldn't h - _it_ m - me l - like th - that." Oh shit. 

Hand partially extended, Roy took a step towards him without thinking what he was going to do and in turn, Jason flinched back harder in the face of this 'imposter'. The indecisive mess of feelings that had dominated him before had retreated, sent running by the overwhelming waves of stark fear. Jason was scared of him. Again, Jason was scared of him. Or was it him? Jason now didn't believe Roy was who he said he was because he got it into his head that this behaviour wasn't Roy. He was right, of course, he was so right. This situation, Sionis' threats on Lian's life, it had forced his hand with the crowbar and noose, and so many other things, and Jason had begged for Roy to 'make it fair' but he hadn't meant slapping him. That was something Sir did, no one else. Until now. Made sense it would confuse him so completely.

Roy was confused too. There was no good choices left. When had they used them all? The day he met Jason? When he chose to raise Lian? When he introduced Jason and Lian? In the long run, that hadn't been a good idea either.

" Jason, I'm sorry, okay? I was trying to stop you hurting yourself and..." Roy stopped when he could see none of this was going through and Jason, shaking with his lips turned red by self-inflicted bloodshed, stared at him with his eyes narrowed to shield them with a veil of lashes.

It reminded Roy of the stray dog he had once seen in the alley outside his apartment, cowering and backed into a corner at the contact with humanity when he tried to approach it.

That dog, he found later, had been hit by a car. It was a dog, an animal, but something about it made Roy think it deliberately run into the road. 

Fear did that, if it was strong enough. It drove you to do things you never normally would. Like burn the initials of your torturer, the man who destroyed you and your life, into the face of the person you loved. Or used to.

" Wh - who are you?" Jason whispered.

*

" You see, Jay? No one wants to hurt you." The person with the pretty smile, Dick, said. He was trying to make his face look gentle, to stretch that smile all the way across it, but it didn't reach his eyes and Jason could tell exactly how fake it was. In truth, he looked sad. 

After Not-Roy left, Jason supposed he'd told Dick about the encounter because now Dick was trying to brainwash him into believing Not-Roy was Roy. His Roy. Jason didn't know what it was, but something had happened to his Roy and now this person - this _thing_ \- had replaced him. It was another of Batman's tricks. It had to be. 

Jason couldn't see the angle here but there was one, lurking beyond the lines of sight.

" B - Batman does." Jason exhaled with the words. They hurt because he had to keep repeating them to all these ignorant people. They thought Batman was a _nice_ , innocent, non-sadistic man. _Fools_. The repetition stung more than the bruise on the side of face and the slowly healing cuts on his tongue. 

" No, Jason." Dick sighed deeply, breathily, like he was tired of this. Jason was tired too. He just wanted Sir to come back. No matter how much Dick and those others  - excluding Batman and Not-Roy - claimed they loved and cared for him, he still wanted Sir much more than them.

Dick leaned heavily against the back of his chair, the wood of it creaking as he pushed against it. There was something other than this on his mind, Jason could tell. There was something Dick was hiding and not just from him.

" Bruce - Batman - loves you. So much. Sionis telling you he was the bad guy? That's not true." 

" I - it is." Jason simply stated and believed it more than he believed in oxygen or water existing. 

Just then, in the middle of the conversation going nowhere, the head of the boy Jason recalled people referring to as 'Tim' or 'Master Timothy' on occasion, popped through the gap in the door he creaked ajar. He quickly regarded Jason but then locked his entire attention onto Dick.

" Dick, Bruce wants to see you in the Cave."

Jason noticed Dick stiffened ever so slightly. Good. Maybe he was starting to realise how dangerous Batman was. 

" I'll be there in a second, Tim." He said and the boy left again, but not before giving Jason a small, kind and gentle smile that's meaning Jason couldn't decipher before he was gone. Dick stood, chair scraping back against the floor as he did.

" I'll be back just now, Jay." 

Mute, Jason nodded, although he didn't really want Dick to come back. These people kept coming and going and he was so fucking tired right now. 

" Bruce loves you, Jason." Dick assured him again and no part of Jason wanted to hear such a profound lie as that. How was it that Dick could lie so effortlessly? Maybe he was lied to as well? God, Batman had all these people fooled.

Dick looked at him. " He gave you a blood transfusion when you were hurt. He wouldn't do that if he wanted to hurt you." And with that, he departed, retracing his presence before he could see the true weight his words held. The way they impacted like a meteor that stopped your heart somewhere in your throat. Jason felt like he'd been slapped by Not-Roy again. Blood transfusion? What the hell? 

Quickly delving into the familiar valley of horror, Jason's wide gaze slowly drifted down to the pale undersides of his arms, the blue veins shining clearly through his skin like river deltas.

 _Blood transfusion._ Was that true? That Batman gave him a blood transfusion?

Fixated, he stared harder and harder at his arms until it felt like his eyes were about to pop out of their sockets and roll down his chest.

 _Batman_. _Blood_. Batman's blood was _in_ him? In his veins? That's what Dick said and though he may be lying about that too, it was too big a risk to take. Jason could feel the wicked, evil fluid pumping through him like knives and chunks of glass and it made him squirm inwardly and outwardly.

He'd felt wrong since waking up in that hospital. Ruined somehow. And this was why. The corrupt, corrosive blood flowing through his body was the culprit.  

God, Batman was fucking with him in ways he hadn't even imagined possible. How far would this shit keep going until he finally stopped? Until Jason was dead, he supposed.

Jason felt sick with the knowledge, thick beneath his near bitten through tongue and pushing bile from his stomach and his eyes, though held captive by the rivers beneath his arms, found it within them to drift to the water glass Dick had forgotten on the nightstand. Half full or half empty.

Wincing, Jason grit his teeth as he leaned over and reached for it as far as he could with his arms cuffed. Fingers shaking from the effort of the stretch, Jason managed to clasp the rim of it and lift it over to himself, all the while thinking,

_" I have to get it out. Have to get the bad blood out."_

The sharp shards of soon-to-be-broken glass would do the trick nicely.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Apparently, stories are supposed to get better for the characters nearing the end…. who ever heard of such a thing?
> 
> Btw, the second half of my creative brain, Nance, gave me a lot of ideas so much of the credit goes to them.


	20. Chapter 20

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Serious trigger warning, this contains graphic self harm.

" Dick, over the past few weeks since Jason was recovered, Riddler, Two-Face and several other members of the Rogues Gallery have gone missing."

Dick bit the inside of his cheek, arms crossed over his chest and the dull points of his fingers burrowing into his muscle, leaving a depression there. Like any time they spoke in the Cave, it was with Bruce facing the army of computer monitors with his hands on the keyboard, working fast to fill up empty spaces on the screen with text. Dick stood behind, or slightly on the side, his eyes cast downward, holding the cold stone floor captive in a hard unrelenting stare.

" And? Why are you telling me this? Maybe the pricks realised we were gonna destroy them for what they did to Jason, so they skipped town?" Oh boy, that would have been the smartest thing for them to do.

" Unlikely." Bruce grunted out the side of his mouth and Dick took note of the hostility and sheer callus-nature behind it. No one was in a good mood after the way they found Jason, but Bruce took it hardest of all. Maybe because Jason was convinced he was the devil here, and was thus terror-stricken by just the sound of his name rolling off someone's tongue. 

Bruce had become cold if he never was before, uncaring about anything that wasn't work related. Or so he panned it out to look. Dick knew for a fact that he went to see Jason every time he was unconscious and that he'd cried on more than one of those times, seen stepping out of the door with bloodshot eyes and tear streaks drying beneath them. Dick knew because he never left Jason unsupervised if he could help it, surveying him from either the cameras he planted in the room or from the tree outside the window. In his head, Dick did knew it was impossible for Sionis or Dent or Nygma or any one of them to ever sink their clutches into his Little Wing ever again, but he couldn't convince his paranoid heart of that.

Not after breaking his promise to Jason. 

" What do you think's going on then?" Dick pressed because Bruce wouldn't have wanted to discuss this with him unless he had some ideas and scenarios of his own to present. Dick did hope _that_ was why he was here.

" I don't have a waterproof chain of events yet." That was rare. " But the timing between each disappearance is consistent. A week apart at most."

" Hm. Sounds methodical." Dick observed, chin between his index and thumb, lightly rubbing patterns into his skin as he thought. " Organised."

" Exactly."

" So... what? Rogues Gallery serial killer?" Would that be such a bad thing? If Dick ever thought not, then he only needed to remind himself of the word whore carved into the flesh of his brother's back and suddenly, he was rooting for the guy making the rogues go missing.

" I considered it."  Bruce said while going through surveillance camera footage of what Dick recognised as the Iceberg Lounge, Penguin's snug little gambling hangout and nightclub. Frame by frame, he picked apart what the camera had caught but it was too grainy and ill-lit to make out any betraying details of the scene. Dick guessed he was looking for anything that could give away who snagged the Penguin. 

The same Penguin who choked Jason with his dick and whacked him repeatedly with his hardwood cane.

The fingers already laying waste to his biceps tightened to the point they quivered. If he weren't such a natural about hiding his rage it would have been clear to see, displayed openly on his face.

" But there are no bodies being found." Bruce finished, bringing the statement to a close without the air of finality. He was leading this to a point far slower than usual.

" Maybe he's hiding the bodies? Or maybe they're not dead and just abducted or something?"

With the last word, Bruce turned full way around in his chair to face Dick, hand remaining laid flat on the computer table. His black eyes were piercing in the force of their stare, glinting with the cold fires of anger he had possessed since finding Jason. Dick wasn't sure if he was really wanting to know where the rogues were or hoping it was hell.

" Why would someone be abducting them, _Dick_?"

Dick's posture straightened the fraction it had been lacking and his muscles grew tense with the tone of accusation that had gone unhidden. He'd suspected, known even, that Bruce was building to something like this. He didn't say it outright but he didn't have to.

He made haste to dismiss it. " There's no concrete evidence that anyone is making them vanish, Bruce. No evidence at all, actually."

" The timing is too coincidental for this to be non-orchestrated."  

" Yeah." Dick pinched the bridge of his nose hard enough to see stars. " I agree it's weird timing, but like I already suggested, maybe they're skipping town in fear of what we're gonna do to them?" He lifted his head to look at his father figure again. " Because we are going to bring fire and brimstone down on them once we find where they're hiding, _right_?"

Bruce appeared annoyed by him going so far as to question that. He pursed his lips. " Of course, Dick. They'll pay. Every one of them but we can't allow ourselves to do something we'll regret." That seemed specifically intended as a point for Dick and Dick muttered in his head that he sure as fuck wouldn't regret offing the rogues personally and with the mirrored level of cruelty they'd shown Jason. He was sure Bruce felt that way too, inwardly.

That was what Bruce preached about, right? Justice, right?

In his view, changed the way they changed Jason, it was.

" If you're right about this," Dick finally ended the tense silence winding between them, " That someone is making Two-Face and Penguin and the rest go missing, then think about what they did to your son, my _brother_ , before you go in on a white horse to save them."

Bruce didn't give his answer to that but Dick sensed there was more he wanted to voice. There was something between them then, a statement or accusation that went unworded but still rang clear. Dick knew Bruce wanted to ask him or state what he thought was going on here.

But he didn't. Recurring and for the longest time - a second or eternity - neither spoke, until Dick finally had the last word.

" If you wanna chat again, I'll be with Jason." Dick turned his back on Bruce and started walking away. He really couldn't have cared less if the rogues were all rotting in a ditch somewhere and he got the notion that Bruce didn't either, but Batman couldn't stand back and let that happen. 

 _Strange,_ Dick inwardly muttered in a voice far darker than the one he ever let be heard. Batman didn't have a worry or care about standing back and letting much worse things happen.

And he was certain that Bruce _knew_.

*

The glass had been easy to break against the metal rail of the bed and though the cuff was widely covering his wrist, he could still see a good portion of his arm and the arteries shining beneath the skin.

Jason hissed a pained, breathy whine through his clenched teeth chipping together under the grind of meeting surfaces. With the chains holding his arms so far apart, dragging the sharp piece of glass down his wrist was harder than he'd expected. No matter having a clear view of the thickest vein to trace over, he kept slipping with the damn thing he couldn't hold properly in between the few fingers the rogues had let him keep. And that didn't make for a clean cut but no matter.

Hand clasping the shard quivering uncontrollably, Jason pushed the point deeper, harder into his flesh and watched with morbidly keen fascination as the deep crimson pulps of blood squeezed from betwixt the ragged partings.

Batman's blood, not his. Batman's _bad_ , corruptive blood.

The cold stabs of his pain receptors screaming at his brain, wanting him to stop, rang loud through his head but he forced himself to believe the lack of the wicked fluid he was draining out of his arm would be the answer. The answer to a plead he didn't know he kept on repeating.

A stray whimper became a full-on shudder as the sharp edge glid through his muscle and skin, the downward pull towards himself becoming easier with the dripping slick blood acting as involuntarily lubricant for the glass.

Jason was starting to feel nauseous, dizzy with his coordination rapidly becoming non-existent, so much of Batman's life fluid was splashed across his chest, his arms, and he couldn't help but wonder how he was going to slit his throat and other wrist when his vision was already so fuzzy. 

His head was getting heavier, harder and harder to keep up, eyelids beginning to weigh a tonne, but the more of Batman he got out of his body, the less tainted he was. Yes, the difference was noticeable.  Far better, the drip-dropping soothing as a mother singing a lullaby. 

Barely able to focus on the pulsating blue vein he was using as a guideline, the spurting gash was nearing five inches down his wrist when the door Dick had closed upon leaving cracked open. At first, there was nothing disconcerting or sudden to it, but when a pair of blue eyes that flew wide open and horrified locked on him, all he could hear was,

" Ohmygod! _Jason_!"

 

On the second he pushed the door open, Dick stepped into a horror-show riding on the tail end of a nightmare. The room was jam-packed with the overbearingly potent reek of copper, so thick he could taste it spread out on his tongue in layers. Jason, a piece of glass buried deep in his wrist, blood dripping seemingly off every surface. 

His breath slammed into an invisible barricade wedged in his windpipe and his heart careered right after, on its heels and a hair's breadth behind. His whole body was crushed from all sides by a jolt from a higher power.

" Ohmygod! _Jason_!" Dick screamed and in less than two strides of physic defying speed, was there to snatch his brother's hands in both of his own and struggle with him to pin them down.

" N - no, Dick! D - _don't_ -" Jason tearfully begged and somehow got blood over half his face, " H - have t - to get t - the blood out-!"

Dick wasn't listening to the insanities spilling from his mouth faster than he could bleed. Against Jason's weakening protests, he enveloped the gash in a tight grip, having to release Jason's other arm to do so. The thick shard of glass stuck pointedly out of Jason, sticking upright and dip-dyed crimson between Dick's fingers.

" Bruce - _Alfred_! Someone get in here _now_!"

But no one came running before Dick's fingers started slipping on the oil sleek blood. He fastened the clamp tighter and simultaneously reached for the corner of the tossed around and crumpled blanket to better stem the flow.

Sobbing, Jason was shaking so hard, body refusing to allow Dick to help him. Weak though he was and getting weaker still, Jason put everything he could into hitting, kicking Dick's hands off him.

" Little Wing, stop! Stay still or I _can't_ -!" Leaning over Jason, Dick had left his entire body open to the knee Jason slammed into his chest. The blow though not nearly as hard as Jason could have managed with all his blood and bones not broken, was hard enough and sent the air screaming from Dick's lungs, the second knocking him back from Jason with his hands flying off the wound.

" Have t - to get it o - out. H - have t - to get it out.  Have..." Jason repeated on and on to himself, ritualistically, rhythmically, like a chant that he had to mutter over the sound of his breathing speeding up and the squelching of raw muscle as he dug his fingers into the inside of the gushing lesion. He started pulling, yanking out what he could no matter how he made himself scream and sob. The glass came out first with a fresh spurt of blood to cover old and after that, sinews, strips of meat, the skin was being pulled far back.

" JASON!" Dick bounded onto his feet, lungs burning, and before reaching Jason for the second time, the door swung open, hitting then bouncing off the wall twice, and Bruce burst in with Alfred on his heels. The shouts and screams alerted them in the nick of time.

" Master Jason!" Alfred exclaimed, horror-struck and  Bruce didn't say anything, he didn't have to, the sight of him enough to make Jason stop what he was doing with a terrified gasp.

" N - no. _Nononono_ -" Getting a burst of renewed vigour intense blood loss aside, Jason started tearing at the cuffs, kicking, wrenching his arms back and the slick coat of blood allowing him to begin slipping out of a restraint.

Hardwired to respond, never freeze despite whatever horrors he was seeing, Bruce paid little heed to Jason screaming for him to get away and focused on the slit wrist and the way he was throwing himself to all sides. Dick reappeared beside him and together they pinned Jason to the bed while Alfred applied pressure to the wound, holding a scrunched up corner of the blanket to it.

" G - get _off_ m - me!" Jason's upper body _jerked_ up like a higher power willed it, right into Bruce's arms where he wrapped them tightly around his son and held him against his tormented struggling. He was close enough to Bruce's ear for him to hear the whispery trembling mantra of 'lemme go, lemme go, lemme go.'

" Dick," Bruce grunted while Jason shook under the weight he pushed on him to keep him down. There were tears rolling down Jason's cheeks, dampening Bruce's shoulder and the shirt covering it. His skin felt over-sensitive to the hot, jagged exhalations coming hard and fast against it. He noted Jason more deprived of colour than ever, almost half the contents of his veins staining the sheets and somehow, each soul in the room. 

" Help Alfred get those cuffs off." 

Visibly far worse than shaken up, Dick complied with a quick half nod and went full hands to the blood-soaked restraint, Alfred moving aside to let him work. Bruce gave them a sideways glance and turned back to Jason, letting him down from the forceful embrace when he was growing increasingly groggy and entirely delirious. He'd stopped begging, lips moving barely to words unheard, eyes beginning to close. Bruce bit the inside of his cheek, one arm across Jason's shoulders, the other his midriff and he made sure he was using the bare necessary force to keep from hurting him worse.

" D - done, Bruce." Dick whispered, eyes far-off, jaw quivering with small trembles, and the cuff chainlinks clinking loudly against one another when they fell off Jason's wrists. Dick grabbed a roll of bandaging and pads from the stockpile of medical equipment on the dresser top and hurried to help Alfred wrap them around Jason's self-inflicted laceration.  

" How bad, Alfred?" Bruce asked, not looking away from Jason as he did. He was two-thirds unconscious by now and still feebly swatted at Bruce with his uninjured arm, convinced he was worse off when in his presence. 

" It's deep, sir. Uneven. We need to take him to Doctor Thompkins now. He's lost a litre of blood in the least." 

Grim-faced, Bruce took in the news silently, disbelieving though he shouldn't be, that Jason had done this to himself. Why? What had set if off or had Jason retrogressed to the stage where attempted suicide was random? 

Various tubes disconnected, once his wrist was wrapped up and the blood flow stemmed best it could, Bruce slipped his arm beneath Jason's knees, the other behind his back, and hoisted him off the bed bridal style into his hold. It was effortless when Jason weighed so little nowadays, at least forty pounds less than a year ago. He used to be two-twenty pounds of pure muscle, a powerhouse capable of going toe-to-toe with Batman himself, and now his entire body felt like a sack of loose, fractured bones. And his chest was wet and sticky with the contents of his son's veins, a sensation not to be desired.

" Call ahead, Alfred." Bruce said to the shaken butler whose blood-stained hands shook and his wide, fear-filled for Jason eyes tracked Bruce across the room.

" Yes, sir." He hurried away to do that, glancing at Jason on his way out. 

Dick followed after Bruce, for the second time in less than a month head-to-toe in an impossible quantity of his little brother's blood. And this time... Dick knew he had caused it. His fault entirely when _he_ left that glass there and distinctly recalled Jason saying 'I have to get it out'. It didn't' take a lot to realise what he meant, the _blood_ pumping through him, blood that Dick had mistakenly informed him Bruce transfused from his own veins to save his life. Dick had thought, hoped that the knowledge would lead Jason to a crumb of belief that their father wasn't going to harm him, but instead it had backfired like a faulty shotgun to the face. 

Fuck. How had he been so fucking dumb to say that without considering the very negative consequences?

" Bruce," Dick said when they powerwalked side-by-side down the hall and towards the cars in the garage. During the day, the Batmobile was too conspicuous, too obvious so they had to resort to civilian transportation. 

" What?" Bruce demanded with a snap, face angry and dark, brought on by what Dick was sure he perceived as his latest massive failure. Jason trying - not for the first or second time - to kill himself. Only this time he'd come closer than any time before. What was going through Bruce's mind, Dick could only imagine, and when he did, it was somewhere identical to his.

" I think..." Dick whispered, so entranced in devastating, tormented guilt, the sheer crushing weight of responsibility, that he couldn't raise his voice any higher. " I think  I did this."

Bruce shot him a quick stare from the corner of his sight then directed his gaze forth. 

" We'll talk later." 

They never did.

*

Dick must have scrubbed layers of skin off his hands, his arms, face, just to get the drying splashes of blood off then stared for minutes as the pink water swivelled down the drain hole of the sink. Washing away Jason's life force like dishwater, felt so wrong but wearing it felt worse. It was flaking, scratchy, on his skin. And it itched like hell between the layers of his clothes.

Leslie hadn't sounded overly relieved when she said this was another calamity Jason would pull through and Dick could understand why. If Jason had succeeded, it would have been agony for the rest but mercy on him. He wondered if it was the cruellest form of torture towards Jason to date, to force him to keep on living. Leslie probably thought so too but selfishly, no one voiced it and they continued to bind Jason with those strings that connected him to life when he wanted so badly to sever the connection.

Bruce and Roy were there with Jason despite how scared he was of them. He was scared of everyone at this point. Upon seeing what Jason had done to himself, Roy had wanted to hunt Sionis down then and there, rip him to pieces more than he ever had before, and Dick had almost told him he had beaten him to that pleasure. 

They'd gotten to Jason minutes, seconds before it would have been too late. _Seconds_. Dick felt sick and he couldn't stay in that hospital room where they'd stuck Jason in a straight jacket any longer. He ran out, or walked, or drifted when no one was watching, it was a blur all the way from A to B, B being that place Roy had confirmed as the location Sionis had kept him and Jason at. That secluded, confidential place no one but a select few knew about, which left even Bruce out of the loop the way it needed to be. 

The guards? Gone when their paychecks stopped getting signed by their boss. Security was nada, legally this place didn't exist, and Dick had the abandoned, reinforced and soundproof estate all to himself. Well, him and his guests. 

Dick locked and double checked the integrity of every door on his way to the living room. The halls were dark and soundless, many rooms still bearing the remembrance of Jason's and Roy's joint suffering at Sionis twisted desire. Dick had long since suspected that gimp masked fucker had done more to Roy than he would ever confess to, Roy who no matter their current rocky relationship was and would always be his close, beloved friend. That coupled hand-in-hand with Jason's emotional and physical obliteration caused by him reminded Dick all too well why he'd had to do what he did.

As he stepped into the living room used as a space to torture people he loved, Dick glanced at the black leather mask driven into the wall with faultlessly sharp and silvery glinting nails, points stuck through the forehead.

He'd sworn no one was getting away with what was on that tape, and he'd fucking meant it.

" Harvey, Ozzie, still alive, I see," Dick said to the two glaring men tied onto opposing sides of the oddly placed totem pole in the corner of the room. Blood drying from numerous wounds was forming hard casings on their skin dirtying them alongside bruises from his escrima sticks. He didn't give or care that he had come here unmasked and they could see Dick Grayson's face clear as day, he was 100% confident they weren't getting out of here to use that information. He'd make sure of it.

" Ed," he nodded towards Nygma, still moaning pathetically like a dying dog from when his hands were crushed by the hydraulic factory vices Dick had found and modified to suit his purposes. Every twitch Nygma made triggered the highly sensitive sensory pads and squeezed the vices shut harder.  That was two days ago and the steely machines still held him their hostage. In his hands, every bone was shattered, muscles torn, nerves destroyed. Satisfyingly similar to what he had done to Jason. Bent his fingers back until they snapped off.

Dick didn't know what this newly introduced sadistic version of him was or how alright with it he was. Or was it sadism when he didn't enjoy what he was doing? He viewed it as not a pleasure, but as a chore that needed completing.

While he dwelled on the idea of his hidden new self, Dick picked something up off the lavish oak wood and glass coffee table sitting in the centre of the room. The object, it was cold, brightly coloured and metallic, fitting snugly between his hands as he stared deeply into the vacant twin holes staring back at him.

Red Hood's hood.

 _Jason's_ hood.

He'd kept it since finding it at the warehouse because it added an interesting element to the act of repaying the rogues. Lost in thought, he lifted it over his head and pushed down, hiding his face with Jason's former identity.  Former because Red Hood was as dead as Jason himself was. When the air catch hissed and secured the helmet over his head, it finalised what he was here to continue doing. How suiting that when the rogues were suffering for their atrocious acts, it was Red Hood's face that they saw. After all, this wasn't Nightwing who was doing this, it wasn't Dick Grayson, it was someone else. Maybe not even Red Hood.

" Feel safer behind that mask, pretty boy?" Dent sneered with malice, the act of talking reopening the ugly split in his lip. Fresh blood dribble down his chin.

" Would you feel safer if I wasn't wearing it?" Dick inquired with a brow arched that went unseen, fairly sure that was the case. It helped remember just why they were here. _Jason_.

" Nothing to say today, Oz?" Dick asked Cobblepot on his way past to the wall mounted TV remote. Of course, he had nothing to say, not with the thrice halved pieces of his cane stuffed down his throat and lips sewn shut to keep it that way. A decent vengeful replicate of Jason's fate at his hands. Black, orb-like eyes glared murderously at Dick as he passed.

" Anyone remember where we left off?" Dick asked them without expecting an answer as he snatched the remote off the couch and switched the TV on. The screen flashed on to display the grainy evidence of what they had done to his brother, paused at one horror or another. Dick had tortured himself by watching this through several times, each replay as anguishing as the last,  despite knowing what would happen it couldn't get easier, but he needed to do it to get every one of the tens of people there that night. And he needed to do it because he deserved punishment too after breaking his promise and now after planting the latest disastrous thoughts in Jason's head.

Dick unpaused it and his ears were immediately filled with screams and cheering, whistling, whooping, and laughter, when Bane got his hands on Jason sometime after Joker danced off.

 _Joker_. There was another name to add to his growing list of targets.

Though he had seen this more times than he could admit to, it didn't get any easier to watch Bane hold Jason down with no regard for his skinned back and obvious, indescribable agony. Revulsion, pain, Dick's heart was bleeding and screaming at Bane to stop when he pulled Jason's blood-soaked jeans into a bunched up mess around his thighs with one colossal hand wrapped entirely around Jason's head, pushing it into the ground.

Dick's arms tightened around himself and the helmet hid the look of agony streaking in strengthening waves across his face. He wanted to badly to leap into that virtual world, right into the past and save his little brother from all of this hell. But he couldn't. He could only watch Bane, smirking, drive that humongous cock of his straight into Jason  and start rocking his hips back and forth with far more force than it was clear Jason could deal with. He could split Jason in two down the middle and still keep going.

Dick's thumbs were burrowing into his biceps, heart rate accelerating. 

Less than half of Bane's length in his guts and Jason was screaming,  crying, _begging_ him no. And the colossus didn't care and chuckled, murmuring vulgarities in his native tongue while he thrusted harder, pulling himself almost all the way out before ramming right back in. Jason looked like a child beneath the mass of the far bigger man, so small and scared and in the throes of white-hot excruciation. Lubeless, Bane was tearing him up inside, crushing his head into the floor which must be what gave Jason those hairline fractures on his skull.

Dick winced when with a loud crack, some part of Jason's body gave way to the seven foot giant's slamming in and out, a blood curdling screech ripping free from his helpless little brother's lips, red droplets flying in all directions. After that he went floppier, slacker, spine curving into an arch in involuntary response to Bane's movements and teary glazed eyes staring at the floor. He was  whispering something too silent for Dick to hear and the camera angle didn't allow his lips to be read.

It went on.  Dick could make out the outline of Jason's stomach,  straining against the tattered remnants of his shirt, bulged out inhumanely by the sheer girth of Bane's cock wrapped around his insides. The stretch on his skin was massive. 

Dick couldn't tell which one of them was screaming louder, Jason or himself inwardly.

Bane would be harder to capture than Cobblepot, Dent, Nygma, Sionis, and the rest, harder to torture too, but watching this tick by for minutes, Dick vowed to find a way to accomplish it. Laying their grimy, disgusting paws on Jason would be the one thing he would make every rogue in Gotham regret until the second he ended them. 

If Bruce saw this sick film, actually _saw_ how bad it had been, how petrified and tortured Jason had been, Dick wondered if he would dawn a red helmet of his own and join him in his crusade to end these fucks. Yes, the aftermath painted a clear image of horror but seeing it happen was a thousand-fold worse.

With the audio-less click of a button, Dick froze the footage at the moment where Bane grabbed Jason's arm, hand big enough to wrap twice around it,  and pulled it from the socket in the act of pinning it behind his back. It got worse from here on out as if that was somehow even possible, and after bearing witness to Jason slitting his own wrist that afternoon, it was more than he could stomach for one day.

Now that the rogues had had their annual video taped reminder of why they were here, what they had done, they could get down to the purpose of their involuntary presence.

Dick could feel the colour had drained from his face and beneath his tongue, the thick rubbery sense of repulsion. There were probably tears in his eyes too. Wouldn't be the first or only time he was brought to tears by that goddamn tape he kept masochistically watching. His stomach was performing acrobatic flips rivalling his own skills once he turned back to the selection of rogues, expression that would have given away weakness hidden.

" So, where shall we start today?" Dick put the remote down and from beside where he set it, gathered the cold, heavy 9 mm Jason used to have four of strapped to him at all times. This, in fact, was one of Jason's. As he held it, he saw a glimmer of dismay and hope flicker through the eyes of the cowardliest specimen, Nygma. He must think he was in for a bullet to the brain instead of the torturous way Dick had ended Sionis' miserable life for them to see. That power drill slowly winding its way through his gut had been a good opening act to let them know, he meant business.

Emotion straining his voice, yet to return to a normal pitch through his seething red anger and the sadness that would never leave, that too was hidden by the vocal modulator installed in the hood.

" No suggestions? Not even you, Harv?"

Dent spat a glob of blood and spit at him, both sides of his face screwed into a glare that didn't suit his predicament of helplessness.

" How about you find your place on your knees like that whore brother of yours?" 

Dick's teeth set and he cocked the gun already shaking with anger, not the non-existent chance that he might hesitate. Looks like they were starting with Dent today. 

"Reminding me of what _you_ did to Jason? Not wise, Harvey, not wise at all." Dick raised the firearm level to Dent's ugly head, between the eyes, considering his aim a moment before he began lowering it.

" But _I_ didn't forget, _Jason_ won't forget, and neither will _you_." 

Click, bang, scream, Dick pulled the trigger back and discharged a chunk of lead into Dent's lap, blowing off that damn cock he'd been oh-so-happy to hurt Jason with.

Him and the rogues, they were just getting started.

*

Burning, stinging, everything was on fire despite the drugs pumped into him, but that was no distraction. Jason had overheard them talking, someone was talking, that Sionis... Sir wasn't going to come back. Sight gone again, he didn't know who had said it nor did he want to believe it. Sir would come back. He would. He promised he would never let Batman hurt Jason again and yet here he was, being hurt by Batman on the daily.

As he sat slumped over wherever they had left him, Jason tried blinking back the darkness or moving his arms from their entrapment at his sides, but a cast or straight jacket or something of that nature was securing them around him. Maybe it was the former they had used because he could feel its squeeze around his chest as he tried to breathe. So much as a shiver from him and small but sturdy chainlinks would tingle together. They had cuffed him again. 

Stuporous as his mind dragged its feet with each thought, Jason really couldn't tell where he was, hospital or that mansion, but there was no sickening stench of blood here, which meant it was in him where it didn't belong. He hoped to god Batman had transfused more of that vile liquid into him because in the straight jacket, getting it out again would be much harder. 

He kept mulling it over in his head that Sir wasn't coming back. Ever, as that someone had said to another someone. They'd vowed Sir wouldn't ever get within a mile of Jason ever again and they'd sounded so angry when they said that. The more Jason thought about it, he realised the voice had been similar to Roy's, which meant it must have been Not-Roy, the deceptive skin-walker who had been fooling him for fuck knows how long. Had Not-Roy come here to gloat or try tricking him with those sweet words of comfort again?

If there really was no Sir anymore, then now what? It was clear they weren't going to let him kill himself, weren't going to give him so much as that crumb of mercy, so what now?

_" Who did you used to belong to? Who was your daddy before me?"_

The memory of Sir saying that ran in splintered shards of recollection through his head and riveted into sluggish concentration when it formed a whole image. Used to belong to, because he had belonged to someone before Sir and the white room. Jason had to dig deeper into his memory for the thing he had given as an answer and when he grasped it, it made him shiver worse.

He'd said Batman. Sir had confirmed it. _Batman_ used to be his... owner. Daddy the way Sir worded it.

And if Sir mark two truly was no longer dominating him, which meant.... that now ownership would return to Batman, right? Yes. That sounded right. Much as he hated that, hated every bit of it, Jason knew like everything else, he didn't have a choice in the matter.

Batman was Sir now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Are you surprised by what Dick's doing? Are you angry or do you agree? How'd this chapter feel to you and what thoughts are left behind? Find out in an all-new instalment of I'm an attention whore who likes reading comments.


	21. Chapter 21

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *hand shoots out of coffin* Stop the funeral progression! I'm not dead, it was just terrible writer's block and to make up for it, I come to you with 10K motherfucking words.

It wasn't usual for him to do this. Actually, Roy couldn't recall if he had ever had a one-on-one with _the_ Bat himself. The closest thing his significant other had to a father and they had never held a conversation when it was just the two of them. Sure there was that time at his apartment, but Bruce had only been there because of Jason and Lian had been present. And after yelling at him the way he had at the hospital, Roy wasn't sure what the airspace between them was like.

Roy hadn't meant to wind up in the manor's dining area alone with Bruce Wayne, it just sort of happened whilst he was discussing one or other matter with Tim and Bruce came in then never left. Roy's gaze must have flitted off of Tim for no less than a second and in typical bat kid mannerism, he was gone. The deserter.

And now here they were, standing silently in the face of having no idea what conversation if any, they should add to fill the void. What did they really have to talk about? Jason's condition that was the only thing on anyone's mind of late? The missing rogues who Roy was secretly hoping were all burning to a crisp in the lake of fire? Nowadays, aside from said things, all else had become a buzz of static in the background. Life itself revolved on an axis from one impending disaster to the next.

Roy gulped involuntarily despite a primal instinct from the times of his ancestors knowing not to allow a predator to see his fear, he couldn't do a thing to stop it when those cold black eyes bore down on him, freezing him to the core like liquid nitrogen was involved.  Bruce wasn't staring at him, he was staring into his very soul, picking him apart right down to his most basic habits and tendencies in a way only a seasoned criminal profiler could.  He couldn't tell what Bruce's thoughts on him were, given how he hated his mentor Oliver and vice versa, but he hadn't stood in the way of Roy courting his son, so that was something, right? Actually, no one - especially Bruce - could stand in the way of Jason getting his way as far as everything he did.

At least that was the case before shit hit the fan.

Back in ye good ole days.

Now? Pft. Now they were lucky if Jason gave a straight answer to a yes or no question. If he managed that much, he couldn't do it without stammering like someone was choking him. In his head, maybe they were. Who knew? Jason was more screwed up than a corkscrew.

" How are you holding up?" Bruce finally asked, releasing the toxically strenuous tension grappling the space between them. Roy tried to hide the fact that the man finally speaking up had him release the breath he had been keeping in.

" Uh, I'm...." He was what? Okay? Fine? Those were so vague yet still a considerable step up from what he was actually feeling.

" I'm managing." Just barely. Roy's baby girl was the only thing keeping him afloat and that was because for Lian's sake, he needed to keep himself together. Without her, he would have crumbled to pieces an indiscernible amount of times by now.

Bruce nodded, nothing about the motion betraying that the reply fully went through. If we were being honest here, the man seemed to be in a daze so far detached from his usual nature that aside from the familiar face, could have belonged to a different person.

" And Lian?" Bruce went on. He too, was all too well versed with everything Jason had gotten up to under Mask's command. Including the terror he reigned in Star City.

Roy shrugged his shoulders, the worse-for-wear brown leather jacket he was sporting - Jason's - ruffling with the movement. It hung loosely around him, the sleeve of the right arm empty from the elbow down.

" She has nightmares every single night. She wakes up crying and screaming. And every day she says to me," Roy cleared the fragile breaks from his voice, " _she_ says to me 'daddy, please don't let JayJay near me'." He rubbed the dampness from his sight with the back of his hand, roughly. It hurt every time he had to admit to himself the unfair effects all of his had on the only innocent party involuntarily involved: Lian. He'd give anything, his remaining arm, his _life_ , if it meant time could somehow be reversed and his little girl spared from this nightmare. 

" She had no part in this fucking mess." Roy said, this time with justified anger. He met Bruce's gaze hard and head-on, neither wavering. He could tell Bruce was listening and not just making eye-contact.

" And she gets to suffer like this. I mean, we all drew the short straw, none of us are enjoying any of this shit, but she's a kid. She's six." His hand crushed into a tight fist that saw his knuckles give a string of cracks. " Lian had no part of this stupid undercover op gone this fucking wrong."

Bruce let him vent, taking it in quietly for a while until he asked that thing that must have occurred to everyone by now, perhaps even Jason when he still had splinters of his sanity about him.

" Are you angry at him, Roy?"

" Sionis? Fucking hell, yes, I am. I'd wrangle the mangy bastard-"

" No. Not him. Are you angry at _Jason_? You, Lian, Oliver, none of you would have gotten dragged into this if  you weren't involved with him."  Bruce was pushing this topic in a way that was unlike him. He didn't ever get involved with what was between his kids and their partners, nor did he ever ask about it, especially not ask the partner. 

Roy was on a metaphorical knife's edge here. Should he be honest and risk angering the Bat? Or should he keep spinning the lie he repeated to himself on a daily basis nowadays? Bruce didn't look like either option he picked would be out of place.

" Truth be told, hell yeah I'm angry at him. Jason didn't get us involved deliberately, he did everything he could to keep us away from his gig with Mask. During that year he was undercover for, I'd be lucky if I saw him once every three months. There were so many precautions in place from the beginning and I still don't know how this backfired so grandly, but I'm angry at him. I love him, I don't blame him for what Sionis did, but part of me is still angry at him." Roy swallowed heavily, sending back down those stray emotions that threatened to make him vulnerable with an audience. A Roy Harper classic was to outwardly, always remain steadfast. 

" I mean, he is the sole reason Sionis went after me and then Lian. Jason _burned_ these god-forsaken letters into my face," he gestured to them with a wave of his hand, " I no longer have both my arms, which means I can't hug my daughter properly to comfort her every time Jason trying to slit her throat comes to mind. Is it so wrong that I'm angry?" 

" No. It's not wrong." Bruce said and surprised Roy with how ready the reply came. There was no frown or judgement there when he spoke. There was _understanding_.

" This situation is bad for everyone, but worst for you, Lian and Jason. Lian is terrified of Jason, before that you weren't angry at him. You're responding the way any parent would to their child being under threat, no matter where that threat is coming from. As a parent, your child being afraid makes you want to eliminate what's making them scared. You can't with Jason and that's what's angering you most, because you can't take away her fear."

Roy watched him, caught in a partial gape because Bruce just read him like a fortune teller with eyes on his palm. How did Batman get what he was going through? Cold, unfeeling, king of emotion dishonesty Batman? 

" That's.... yes, that's true." He eventually felt able enough to admit, mostly to himself. It didn't really help, but saying it aloud felt somewhat nurturing. Soothing. Who knew Bruce Wayne was such an A-class listener?

" I can't fix her. I can't fix him. I can just stand by and watch them suffer."

" Time, Roy, time heals." 

Roy cocked a brow. " Think it'll heal everything fucked up in Jason's head?"

Bruce didn't respond this time.

*

Zatanna, Constantine, Deadman, all off-universe and god knows for how long, they weren't available to help with Jason. Martian Manhunter, J'onn, dealing with an intergalactic crisis with select other members of the league, which meant he was inept to lend any aid with his mind-altering powers. Bruce had considered it many times, to just have Jason's memory entirely erased of every trigger word, horrific memory, shred of conditioning and falsified bit of information and peel back the layers of trauma, hurt, fear, and maybe find his son beneath it all. Maybe. Just to find something living there would be enough, something to work with, even if it wasn't exactly Jason anymore.  
   
But everyone who could do what he needed them to were unavailable as if God himself had thought it would be a hilarious joke at his family's expense. 

Bruce paced the halls of his family home as he often times did at night when patrol wasn't occupying him, thoughts and desperate attempts to salvage the situation ripping through his mind in a cacophony of madness. Nothing made sense, nothing seemed smart, and with Jason slitting his wrist open merely two days ago, no part of him believed they could wait for the sentinels of magic or J'onn to return. There simply wasn't time. They could keep Jason under 24/7 surveillance/supervision, restrain him in that straight jacket, drugged senseless for his own good and still, Bruce couldn't help the gut-wrenching knowledge that they were on a timer ticking fast to zero. 

He didn't know what it was, but soon something would give and not for the better.

Unlike what he could be sure Dick was thinking, finding out who was abducting the rogues was not on his priority list and they could rot in hell for all he cared. However, he did need to locate Sionis or in the very least, one of his lab techs who knew what they did to Jason down to every detail. He needed an explanation or clue as to the anomalies in Jason's bloodwork, the trace amounts of a techno-organic substance he couldn't name. It wasn't a known substance, at least not known to him, which left only the option that it was a new invention, birthed in the bowels of Sionis' hidden laboratories and tested on Jason. The blacking out, the slower than average healing, Bruce could only chalk it up to whatever they pumped into his son that was now failing its original purpose. 

For the most part, the rogues had bled the substance out of him and the transfusion helped steady him, but there was still some left that could not be extracted without further knowledge of it, knowledge that could be acquired only through what Sionis knew. There were no existing files either physical or computerised and the only person who knew what Bruce, _Jason_ , needed, couldn't be located.

His best guess was that this.... _rogue_ _killer_ , as Dick referred to him as, was responsible for Sionis' disappearance and not him leaving Gotham in fear of the Bat. He was a bold man, proud, he didn't run, especially from the Dark Knight. So, if he was going to begin fixing Jason on the physical level, he needed to find Sionis. Tim was trying, doing his absolute best to decrypt the coded make-up of the substance, pushing all-nighters until Bruce had to carry him to bed against his dozy protests, and as much effort as he put into it, Tim wasn't making any serious progress fast enough. Bruce himself was looking for the rogue killer with Dick by his side but hadn't told him the true reason they needed to find him.  He was already tearing his hair out over Jason's condition and adding to it.... Bruce was afraid it would tip another of his sons over the edge. Dick didn't have to say it, but as his father, Bruce felt the guilt, self-loathing oozing out of him.

He blamed himself. 

Bruce paced as such a natural that all around him became out of focus to his wanderings until he found himself at the door to Jason's room. He froze and stayed staring at the cold, dark wooden surface that stared back without shame. Leslie had wanted to keep Jason at her clinic longer than three days, but Bruce wanted him where he could watch him in the safety of what was once his home. Here at least, he was safe from the world but not himself. 

Bruce checked the time on the Rolex strapped around his wrist.

 _02:45_.

Jason was usually drugged at this time and would be out of it for about an hour until his body - grown accommodated to too little sleep  - would force him awake no matter the number of medicines trying to weigh him down. He didn't know what Jason thought about during those times he was by himself in the early morning hours. Did he try to remember anything of his life before all this shit? Probably not. Most likely, and this hurt like a bitch for Bruce to admit, that he was waiting for them to either use him or kill him while asking himself why they hadn't already.

Swallowing back emotion brewed by the bitter notion and feeling of helplessness, Bruce creaked the door open and stepped into the cascade of the soft golden light cast into the darkness. He could make out outlines of items of furniture, the desk, some bookcases with nothing in them, a lamp in the corner, the bed, and the unmistakable form of his son. Jason was sitting slumped over as he often did, slumped so far over his spine formed a painful looking arch. His legs were crossed and arms fastened across his chest and to his sides by the straight jacket Bruce hated to have him in. Appearance aside, Bruce could be sure he was drugged senseless. He slept like that whenever he could, the skin grafts over his back still healing and it was probably the only position where the pain wasn't unbearable. 

Bruce came further in and shut the door with deliberate silence, unwilling to risk waking Jason and scaring him. Or terrifying. Terrifying was a more accurate reaction. 

" Nh.. n-no." 

The sound pricked Bruce's ears and Jason's grabbed his attention despite possessing 110% of it already. Feebly, Jason was shaking his head in his sleep, fringe waving to the fastening movement. Bruce's body went stiffer.

" D - didn't m - mean t-t-"

Bruce began approaching him and could hear the muffled sniffling and accelerated breathing not associated with restful sleep, which he doubted Jason had had in the past year.  Jason was whimpering in the throes of whatever nightmare had him in its grips, silent tears cascading down his cheeks, wet and sticky, holding strands of his hair captive to it. Bruce couldn't see his eyes, but knew they were screwed shut tight against what was flashing through his mind right now. A foot away, he bit his lip. What should he do? Hug Jason or leave him alone? He wanted neither and doubted Jason wanted the former. That is assuming he wanted anything anymore. He didn't really have a lot of desire left in him.

" D - d - didn't w - wanna - h - hurt  y - you-" Jason inclined his chin further into his chest, bending his neck so that it looked ready to snap. He whimpered and more tears fell, teeth laying waste to his always bruised lower lip.

That's it. Without a precautionary thought, Bruce leaned down and enlaced his son in his arms, trying to hold the both of them together and at the same time, disallow for anything from the outside world to harm Jason, ever again. Bruce would be damned if he ever let the boy out of his sight again. For just once fleeting instance, they weren't being devoured alive by the hooked fangs in chaos' maw and Bruce exhaled softly, resting his chin on the top of Jason's head, the silken smooth caress of his overgrown locks of hair gentle, almost enough to help momentarily forget the world's horrors. But Jason didn't stop shaking. In fact, it got worse, closer together and more violent and Bruce could hear the small, easily missable sound of his eyelashes fluttering open. He felt Jason's breath quiver against his forearm then stop somewhere in the depths of his throat. It raised fine hairs and goosebumps on Bruce's skin.  

Neither said a word and Bruce began to slowly untangle his son from his arms, realising this had been a mistake by how rigid with fear Jason became. He needed to keep his movements steady, gradual, because fast-paced ones would scare Jason. He allowed for his hands to slide off Jason but before they could fall to his sides and he could back off, Jason shifted with a wince visible in his muscles stiffening, and turned his head to carefully regard Bruce with eyes that glistened nothing but fear.

Bruce felt trapped, cornered, unable to break out of that stare that was pinning him down. He wanted so badly to find the words with which to reassure Jason of his intentions, but past experiences have proven time and time again that keeping his mouth shut was the best course of action.

" C - c - can I - h - help y - you-" Bruce gasped inwardly when Jason spoke, brows flying up at the surprise of his son, for once initiating conversation ranging outside of 'no' and 'get away from me'. He dared to hope this meant there was hope yet for Jason.

" - S - Sir?" But then Jason finished the sentence and all the world's disappointments came crashing down on Bruce, crushing him under the fathomless weight of false hope. And then there was the fact that Jason was referring to him as Sir, his enforced title for Sionis. God, Bruce didn't want to imagine what was going through his head as he uttered that.

" No, Jason." Bruce mumbled on the tail end of a sigh, member of a countless number. His shoulders slumped involuntarily and he cast his gaze down. His fists were opening and closing, not sure of what position to choose from.

" D - did I - I d - do ss - something w - wrong?" He heard Jason's voice go higher, dreading of what he thought was to come. Bruce saw his eyes widen too, get too large  for his skull.

" You didn't do anything wrong, Jason. You're okay." Bruce assured, not really feeling that lie of a last part. He didn't set Jason at ease, he could feel it, his presence alone was enough to have his son tremble like shaken gelatin and brace at even a stray breath from him. He wanted to hug Jason, he came close to needing it, and to make him believe no one was going to hurt him again, but one of those things by itself would give him a cardiac arrest. Kill him. That's when it hit Bruce, truly hit him, that his son, that orphan kid he'd taken in all those years ago, was scared to death of him and likely, that would never change.

He would do anything to change it.

 _Anything_ , cost aside.

" S - Sir?" 

Bruce realised only when Jason's timid voice came creeping into his brain, that he had been completely spazzed out, engulfed in his own world of worries and regrets. Jason was looking at him again, or was it still? Nevermind. There was a certain amount of cautious inquiry in his eyes that didn't go unseen but Bruce didn't know what to tell him. He, of course, wanted to know what Bruce was here for, or what he was _not_ here for.

First things first.

" Don't call me Sir, Jason." 

That seemed to surprise Jason, discomfort him, but he gave a quick, obedient nod of his head.

" Wh - what sh - shall I c - call  y - you?" Stammering, always stammering. It was as if Sionis truly did take everything from Jason, including his ability of formerly glorified witty speech. 

" Bruce is fine." He said and noticed the immediate discomfort on Jason's features grow more potent, like addressing him by his first name was akin to the pain of slitting his own wrist with a piece of broken glass. 

" A  - nything o - other th - than t - that?" Jason asked and seemed to pray he wouldn't have to use Bruce. 

" Jason," Bruce said quietly, taking half a step towards his fearful son without acknowledging his question. The last thing he wanted was for Jason to convince himself he and Sionis were the same when calling him Sir.

" I won't hurt you. I would never hurt you. Do you understand?"

" O - okay." Jason nodded quickly for a second time, sight downward cast, looking so wrong.

Bruce wanted to take Jason's mangled and ruined hands but the straight jacket didn't allow for that, so he settled for cupping Jason's face in his hands and lifting it enough to make sure his son had no choice but to meet his gaze. The touch was gentle and Jason didn't seem too alarmed by it. It actually seemed to calm him to a degree and Bruce took it as encouragement that some of this was getting through to him. Bruce couldn't help the small smile that took his lips by force.

" You're my son, Jason. I love you. You're safe."

 

Sir.... No. It was Bruce.... But that didn't sound right. Maybe Jason could call him Sir in his head? In secret? Yes, that might work.

Sir took his face like he used to and the return to normalcy was comforting in a twisted sense. Would things finally go back to how they were meant to be? Jason leaned into the touch ever so slightly, barely aware of whatever Sir was murmuring above his own relief.  He was saying something, but Jason could only make out barely coherent bits and pieces. 'Son', 'my', 'safe'. Yes, all things his Sir would say to him. For the first time since the rogues, Jason felt well and genuinely, like everything was alright.

Because now Sir, _his_ Sir, was here and he would make everything alright. His methods aside, he would make it right.  

He was expecting, and had for a while, for Sir to grab him and straddle him down, disregard Jason's non-existent ownership for his own body and make him a toy, but no. Soon, much sooner than Jason wanted, Sir pulled away, leaving Jason yearning for that possessive hold again. If his hands had been free, they would be stretched out towards the retreating form. He gave a small whine of protest that went unheard.

Sir sniffed and wiped away something in his eyes. Dirt perhaps. But the wave of emotion that made Jason's skin prickle coming off him, made no sense. _That_ , he could not decipher at all.

" You need to get some more rest, Jason. You're still unwell." Sir said, suddenly impossible to read. Not that that was unusual. Nothing, no part of his body language, was ever telling of his intentions.

" N - no - no - 'm f - fine-" as if his body wanted on purpose to contradict what his mouth was saying, a spasm of pain flared up on his recently flayed back and he groaned reflexively, wincing, shutting his eyes, curling in on himself a bit. Sir seemed to get worried at that.

" Jason? Are you okay?"

Biting his lip and eyes forced shut to hold in the tears, Jason nodded vigorously, far too many times to be taken as truth. Good non-existent god, his back was on fire, every inch of the skin graphs burning like acid was eating him away but he couldn't let Sir see that and think he was useless now. He was still very much at Sir's disposal, he just needed to say the word or give the indication and Jason would put aside his own considerable pain to satisfy the man he owed his life to.

_'The day I have no use for you, Jason. I'll kill you.'_

" Jason?" 

 _Breathe_ , Jason, he told himself. Breathe through the pain. He took long, lung-filling inhalations, or at least tried to, but could only manage the small rasping gasps for air that didn't stay in his chest long enough to be put to any use and he felt like he was suffocating. Sir couldn't think he was useless. He couldn't!

But his arms - his arms were bound, he was cuffed, he couldn't move without something going aflame, so how the hell was he going to convince Sir he was still of worth to him?

Jason was starting to get dizzy with the lack of oxygen getting to his head, Sir was blurring, the hyperventilation was wracking his entire being and making everything tenfold more painful and still all he could think of was that Sir wanted him to _sleep_. Not to suck him off like he still could do, but sleep, be immobile and worthless like a piece of furniture destined for the next yard sale.

" Jason?!" Sir snapped his fingers an inch from Jason's face, the twin clicks of sound too loud and reverberating into his eardrums with force not belonging to such a small gesture. Sir's hands landed heavily on his shoulders and Jason tried, he _tried_ to make himself stop shaking but it was like someone was shaking him. He knew it was back to the white room or the rogues if Sir deemed him without use and the thought on itself was enough to cause torrents of terror to surge through him.

" Shh, Jason," Sir's calming voice - strangely, abnormally calming for him - crept in through the haze and dizziness and Jason hadn't even realised he was being embraced, safely tucked away in the bigger man's arms, held there as part of his property and his alone. Slowly, Jason found his breath to begin steadying and his heartrate stop tripping over itself. Whether he willed it or it had been inscribed into him, Sir's hold saw him relaxing to a degree. But he couldn't make his muscles go still, instead, they continued to tremble without his say-so. 

" It's okay, darling." Sir soothed, right into the sensitive skin over Jason's neck. Jason didn't really understand what he was doing at all. Did Sir want to fuck him or not?  The close proximity and hands on him said yes, even him being here screamed that, but there was something not quite right with the rest of Sir's demeanour. 

Jason did what in hindsight, was a little too daring, he leaned up against Sir, trying, hoping that their bodies pressing against one another would make Sir want to fill him with cum or at least do _something_. Touch him, grab him, rip his hair out, tear open the healing wounds, anything to just give Jason an idea of what he wanted because right now, it didn't seem to be sex.

" Wh - what d - d - do you  w - want, Si - Br - _Bruce_?" Jason finally mustered the considerable effort and courage to ask. Sir moved back, opening a space between them that Jason didn't greet as welcome. Shit. He fucked up again, didn't he?

" Jason," Sir said, looking him in the eyes and holding his gaze captive despite Jason knowing full well eye-contact wasn't allowed, but looking away felt like it would be less tolerated so he met those black eyes with unknown intentions behind them.

" I just want you to get better." 

Ah, an order. Now that was something Jason understood at last. Get better. Heal faster, right? 

" And I don't want you to be scared."

Hmm. That was going to be harder to do when Sir scared him but everyone around him was just terrifying, far worse than he was. He did love Sir, Jason really did, wanted nothing more than to please him anyway that he could, but Sir _scared_ him. Maybe it was the raw power, maybe it was how much Jason genuinely needed him, so not being afraid of him wasn't going to be easy. Like with the Bruce/Sir thing, he was going to have to pretend.  Obeying Sir, fulfilling his wishes, was the only thing Jason knew how to do so he was going to have to figure out a convincing act.

" O - ok - ay." Next, as a third order Jason was expecting the age-old 'stop stammering like a dumb bitch' but instead, Sir pulled him closer and held him against his chest, their heartbeats intertwining, one steady and sure, the other not keeping to a rhythmic, healthy thumping.

Sir seemed relieved after Jason made those promises, the first a true one he could keep and the second and empty pledge. Jason could feel that he got what he came for and decided not to question it further. The fulfilment of Sir's wishes saw him calm further.

" It's going to be alright, son." Sir murmured. Whether or not Jason believed that was irrelevant. It came from Sir's mouth so god may as well have uttered it. At least he now had those orders to follow. Get better quick and don't be afraid. Jason could only manage the latter outwardly to some menial degree.

*

" Have you noticed there's something.... off, with Jason lately?" Roy inquired, glancing at Dick as he drove towards the mansion. Dick didn't acknowledge his glance but shifted his hands on the wheel.

" No."

Roy took the unspoken hint and returned his gaze to the road, not allowing for his eyes to flit to the other again. There was something off about Dick lately too, and more than just the obvious toll Jason's condition had taken on them. They still weren't in great terms, but they were on speaking ones, the strain between them gradually fading without being asked to be excused. It was just sort of happening and while that felt good, Roy had known Dick many, many years, much longer than he had known Jason, and could tell he wasn't himself. Dick used to love attention, a self-proclaimed whore for it, but now he couldn't bear when someone looked at him. He'd writhe under the unwanted acknowledgement and not meet the other's gaze. 

If Roy didn't know any better, he would say DIck was afraid of someone finding a dark and hidden truth about him if they stared for long enough.

" He's been really calm lately." Roy finally said, trying to look past the out of place vibes coming off of Dick.

" That's not a bad thing, Roy."  Dick replied quietly, seemingly far-off in a world of his own thoughts. Another new habit he had gotten into was zoning out. Roy often wondered what the hell was going on in that head of his. Dick, always having been the sweet sunshine child of his family... well, this thing was harder on him than other members of his kindred.  

" I know, but it's just... sudden."

" Maybe he's finally getting better."

" Maybe." Roy mused, pressing his tongue against the velvety smooth muscle of his cheek. The idea of Jason recovering was one he would be elated for, were it true. Jason wasn't getting back to normal and even if he was, this was way too fast. Overnight, the shift happened from his Jaybird being frantic and trembling uncontrollably at the sound of 'Batman' to him being calm, still visibly scared, but calm around Bruce. Roy was still Not-Roy and out of the question as far as physical or verbal contact went, so that hadn't changed. 

Roy didn't know what Bruce had done or why Dick wasn't suspicious or anything, but definitely, this new wave of behaviour was amiss. It reminded him of the sudden, immediate responses of Jason's to trigger words, which there was a whole catalogue of.

 _Respond_.

_Drowse._

_Obey._

_Halt._

_Commence._

_Subcon mode_ = subconscious mode, meaning, don't be aware of a thing you're doing.

Those went with some others that Roy had engrained into his memory after seeing Sionis use them, lest they come into absolutely need later on. So far, he'd only used drowse despite how much those times trying to talk to Jason had made him want to command him to _respond_. But with Sionis, respond didn't necessarily mean talk or communicate. From what Roy had seen, it was just the means to make Jason, his Jason, the one he loved and cherished, to reciprocate sexual acts instead of just taking them.

And the last thing Roy wanted Jason to think, was that by saying 'respond', Roy was actually saying blow me.

Roy rested his chin on his hand and gazed out of the car window at the city whizzing past as they made their way along the M5 highway, leading out of Gotham and past the slightly secluded Wayne Manor. Not pitching Dick in on his mind's inner workings, to himself, Roy was entertaining the possibility that Bruce or someone had accidentally uttered a trigger word that made Jason act better? Was there even such a one? It made no sense that Sionis would have had that installed, no sense whatsoever, yet somehow Jason was still capable of fooling Bruce for months, almost a year, with his pretence over the phone.

Jason was calm.... when he was under orders! Of course! Roy now recalled just how tranquil Jason was whenever he was putting into action Sionis' latest demands, be it in the bedroom or in the field.

Had someone told Jason to act better?

It was little more than a hypothesis and Roy couldn't see why anyone would do that, as he couldn't see it helping Jason much in the long run, but he would have to find out more once they got there.

He turned back to Dick, Dick who had his lower lip buttoned for the entirety of the drive, not talking Roy's ear off as he so loved to do. He wasn't himself. None of them were themselves and Roy could sort of understand why hypothetically, Jason may have been given the order he suspected. No, it wasn't helping Jason, but it sure as hell would help those around him if they believed Jason was recovering.

Roy wasn't sure where he stood in this.

But it was just a theory he half hoped was right. A selfish part of him that wanted his Jason back hoped it was right. But really, was wanting _him_ back so selfish? 

" You okay, buddy?" Roy asked Dick, a concerned frown pressing down his carroty brows.

" Yeah." Dick whispered, the vacancy of his eyes reflecting the far-off gander his mind had taken.  It was like he kept replaying something awful in his head, over and over again and it was killing the him that Roy knew. 

" Was just thinking."

It was useless to ask what had been occupying his thoughts, as useless as it was trying to take a guess at it. Like everyone who played a part in this, Dick was another person and Roy wasn't sure he liked this new version of his friend.

Jason, who used to be brave and reckless, was now a petrified mess who pieced sentences together with the utmost care. Bruce, famously cold and uncaring, had asked Roy how he was handling all this. If they had become the opposites of their original selves, what did that make Dick?

*

Jason's eyes looked pretty disproportionate. Maybe it was because they were always widened or because he had lost so much weight his face looked gaunt, cheeks hollowed, eyesockets visible beneath his skin. Whatever the reason was,  they looked disproportionate, too big for his skull, and it was Roy having a  hard time getting used to his appearance. Ridiculous, huh? Everything that had blown up, sprayed shrapnel for miles, killed thousands, and this was what he was adjusting to slowest. 

Anyway, those too-big eyes stabbed holes into Roy when he slipped unseen into Jason's room in the wake of Dick turned away for two seconds. Apprehensive, timid, frightened, Jason kept uncharacteristically quiet when he shut the door and approached, but Roy did notice he was biting his lip, perhaps why he was so silent. He was shaking as well, small trembles that were easy to miss, but he was putting so much effort into acting out that he was okay that it was just painstaking to watch.

Roy sighed, pausing a few feet away.

" Babe, I gotta ask you something,"

A moment of nothing but consideration and Jason cautiously dipped his head in a nod, giving him a hesitant go-ahead.

" Why are you pretending you're not scared of us?" The up-frontness, it was apparent that took Jason by surprise. Everyone else may be falling for his charade, but not Roy. Jason was a natural pretender, he did it all the time but rarely did he used to with Roy. Except he did and Roy used to tell himself he didn't. But that was a lie and get guessed part of him had always known it was.

" 'M - 'm not."

" Don't lie to me, Jason. Not anymore."  

Jason frowned, trying to recall when or what it was that he last lied about, his memories shambles he didn't believe in.

Again, Roy sighed, running his hand over his face and closing his eyes for a few beats and when he opened them once more, it was to Jason surveying him like _he_ was the one with the problem here. From the look he was given, Roy knew Jason was trying to figure out what he wanted, trying to peer through what he was convinced was a disguise of his true intentions. It felt like an impossible chore to talk to him anymore and Roy would give anything to have the Jason back who once threw a grilled cheese across the kitchen at him because he wouldn't shut up about a movie trailer he'd seen. It had hit him in the face, the cheese had exploded and gotten everywhere, and they'd laughed it off with a follow up makeout session where Jason had remarked that dairy and ginger didn't go together.

The memory was bliss as much as it was the cruellest form of torture.

" I've tried, Jay..." Roy eventually said, words coming harder than he expected. It was akin to pushing boulders up a sheer cliff-face.

" I've tried with you, I've tried to help everywhere I can but I don't think I can do it anymore."

" D - do wh - what?" Gaze attenuated, Jason inquired carefully because in all honesty, he probably didn't have a clue as to what his former lover meant.

Roy's shoulders inclined inward when he even had to ask that. He had hoped what he meant _at least_ would be obvious.

" I know this new thing you're doing is an act, everyone else probably knows it too,  but I _can't_ keep up with this damn catch and release thing." He explained, feeling defeated and praying Jason understood something, even if it was a fraction.

" I have to take care of Lian and she's.... She's terrified of you." Roy eased into saying that, didn't know why he bothered since he may as well be conversing with a wall, but a silent assortment of emotions flickered on Jason's features, none distinct enough to be named but they had been there.

" I can't keep going back and forth, Jason. I don't know if you understand or not, but I have to think about my baby girl. I know you think I'm 'Not-Roy' and all, but you at least remember Lian, don't you?"

Studying the silvery buckles of the bleach white straight jacket, Jason gave a small and quick nod, the bangs in his face near hiding it.

" I'm sorry, but I gotta put her first." With every word, Roy felt like his heart was breaking in the literal. He heard the cracks louden as they grew across the glass organ and he was sure it might kill him.

He swallowed back considerable strain. " Babe, I.... I can't be around as much anymore." And there it was, the terrible thing he knew had needed saying for quite some time only it was now that he could muster the strength. If it weren't for Lian needing 100% of him, he would never do this, but his baby came first. Besides, for all the pain this was causing him, he seriously doubted Jason cared even a little if he didn't show his face for a considerable while, it was probably a relief for him since Not-Roy was intent on hurting him.

So if that was indeed the case, why did Jason sink his teeth into his lip and give another one of his rabbit-fast frail nods instead of a verbal response?

Roy palmed the dampness from his eyes without being sparing for force, the searing red pain in his chest not one to go away soon. But this had to be done.

" I'm so sorry, Jay. If there were any other-"

Jason lifted his head, fringe parting like the snow and midnight-hued veil of death's bride. He stared on ahead of him without Roy entering so much as his peripheral.

" You have to take care of her, Roy. She's what's most important." He said without stumbling through the sentence, a second lasting crystal clear clarification before it collapsed in on itself again and he buried his face in his knees. Rare fleeting moments like these, Roy hated that he could catch glimpses of _his_ Jason struggling to get to the surface of this insanity and not be able to grab his hands and pull him all the way through.

" Thanks for understanding." Roy said and somehow felt that Jason did, if even a little. Roy wanted to lift his face and kiss him one last time if only to remember his taste and burn it into his memory, but he couldn't. Jason wouldn't be comfortable with that and if Roy did do it, he wouldn't have the strength he needed to pull away.

His hand found the door handle and he turned it, strands of red hair sticking to the salty streaks glistening on his cheeks.

" You have to be honest with Dick and the others, Jason, otherwise they can't help you. I'm sorry it's come to this. I love you, babe."

It was among the hardest things he ever had to do, but then he was gone, through the door he shut fast behind him and _just_ gone. He kept chanting a half disbelieving mantra in his head, that this had to be done.

It had to be done for Lian.

But Roy hated every bit of doing it.  


Once he was alone again, Jason lifted his head and rested his chin on his drawn knees,  settling his gaze on the empty, unremarkably plain white wall that stared profusely at him. He didn't know why but something in him felt.... sadness? It was an emotion not befitting him, especially since Not-Roy was now going to leave him be, which he should be elated for.

But he felt saddened, like a sinkhole just tore open his chest and sucked in the last parts of him.

" No one can help me." He whispered, the unheard response to the last thing Roy said to him.

*

  
If you asked Bruce, he would call it a judgement call, ask anyone else, and there would be mixed opinions. After what Roy told him he suspected had Jason acting so placid, not as an immediate threat to himself or others, it was a crushing disappointment the likes of which reached a new record high. It didn't take Bruce a second to realise that  Jason misinterpreted the wishes he had expressed some time back as orders. Orders to get better and not be afraid, which outwardly, had been going flyingly up until Roy pointed out what they should have seen, even though their haze of false hope.

Jason _was_ a risk to himself, to everyone him, so back to the difficult verdict Bruce had reached. They don't correct Jason and he keeps doing everything he possibly can to convince them he was recovering, which meant he wasn't harming himself. It was a temporary solution until another means to an end presented itself. Furthermore, and here was an idea Bruce didn't fully want to admit was his, to meld Jason back into himself, they couldn't simply shove him into a world normal by everyone else's standards and expect him to adapt. They had to reeducate him bit by bit, but that meant going back to the beginning. It was bile-inducing, but all Bruce could think may save his son before he did something truly irreversible to himself.

There were things they would obviously draw the line at, the beatings, the sex, the trigger words, but the line also came down heavy and hard on hugs, smiles, excessive kindness because those were things that left Jason out of his comfort zone. It was vile to think that, but it was the painful truth. In small portions at a time, they had to ease Jason back to normalcy. To restore something didn't always mean it could be done in the blink of an eye.

Intellectuals such as Tim and Bruce saw the logic in the plan, be it begrudgingly, but those who fed off of emotion such as Dick took less well to it.

" Fuck that!" He exclaimed, throwing his arms up as he flew to his feet from his seat around the cave's table, where strategic meetings were most often held.

" I'm not subjecting Jay to that again!"

Exhaling deeply through his nose, Bruce buried his face in his hand, pinching the bridge of his nose until he saw stars and Tim took this one.

" It's not gonna be the same thing, Dick. It won't be as bad but we can't fix Jason by smothering him in hugs and well-wishes."

Dick glared at him the likes of which he never would have before. Tim didn't miss out on how truly rage-filled he was, it showed in his eyes, once bright blue with a joy for life, now dark and hiding unbearable truths.

"  I - _we're_ the reason it got as bad as it did, so I'll be damned if we're the ones who make it that way again."

" Dick, it's to _help_ Jason. None of us wants to, but this might be the only way." Barbara argued back, seated in her wheelchair beside Dick. She stared up at him through the clear lenses of her glasses, balanced delicately on her nose.

" No, Babs. We can't. We can't make him think we're Sionis and Pyg and the others."

Tim stood up, pushing his seat back with a _scraape_ against the cold stone floor.

" I get why you're disagreeing, but we're not going to hurt him. In the long run, this is to better his chances of ever being remotely himself again. Easing him back to what's normal bit by bit, starting from what he considers average and working our way from there. We've tried going from zero to a hundred and it didn't work."

" We haven't given him enough time."

" It's been three and a half months. If your hippie 'love can cure all' method was working, we woulda seen progress by now." Tim argued back, fists clenching at his sides despite his intentions to be the understanding party here.

" Believe me, _Timothy_ ," Dick muttered, a sound so low it came out a growl, " _love_ has got nothing to do with I'm handling this."

" I am... Excuses me," they fell respectfully silent - even the arguing brothers - when Cassandra spoke up, her big brown eyes fixed on them with an intent that defied her small voice. She nervously fidgeted with her fingers when they looked her way, as if she hadn't meant to get everyone's attention.

" Go ahead, Cass." Barbara encouraged while the boys exchanged leers filled with misplaced anger, trying to out-stare the other. Everyone's throat was fair game when the tension grew taut enough.

Cassandra took a long, purposeful swallow and cleared her throat before beginning. Verbal communication was something she to this day, was not 100% comfortable with so the effort was greatly appreciated.

" Dick.... he is... good point, but Tim also is unwrong." She hastily darted her tongue across her lips before continuing. " We have _try_ -ed being nice, but.... kindness makes him slitted wrist. Bruce's plan... has to try. Slowly make better, or Jason panics and makes self bleed." 

Stephanie nodded, face set hard into an agreeing expression. Her hands were in front of her on the tabletop, fingers laced around a half drank mug of lukewarm coffee. 

" Cass is right. Sorry, Dee," she shot a glance to Dick, who had retreated into foreboding silence long enough to listen. " We've tried everything else. If we reconstruct what Jason's expects - ruling out the obvious things - and like Tim said, bit by bit take away aspects of his warped reality until he's comfortable and accepting of actual normalcy. Think about it like reverse-psychology, we're giving him what he needs fixing from to fix him."

" Like certain toxins can be used to make antivenom." Tim chimed in with his girlfriend, to which Bruce acknowledged with a nod.

" Then it's settled." He said, releasing his face from the vice-like grip of his fingers. No part of him wanted to be so much as cold to Jason, but if it meant they had a shot of restoring him to half of who he used to be, then he would take it. 

" It's with no pleasure that I realise it's come to this, but from this point onward, treat Jason like an underling, no hugs, no kisses, no smiles, no kindness. Give him orders he can complete in his current state, but nothing too much. Don't ask him questions unless he can answer with yes or no, I've noticed anything else is too difficult for him. It winds him up because he doesn't know what you want to hear.  Do everything you can to restore him to the environment Sionis made, but keep from hurting him or letting him hurt himself. Then," Bruce sighed, " we start to introduce new elements slowly while simultaneously taking away old ones. What's left won't be a finished product but..."

" But will be Jason." Cassandra bravely finished. " Jason who is our Jason."

Head aching, Bruce managed a weak smile at her pure preciousness. She was a sweetly sparkling flame on the end of a candle wick in this.

" Yes, Cassandra."  

" Fuck this!" Dick burst-out, the pitch of his yell giving Cassandra a start and frightening the chirping bats on the ceiling above. They panicked and began darting from place to place in massive clouds of rapidly fluttering wings and loud squeaks. In an instant, the one where Dick's mouth opened, the twinkle of something other than hopelessness was sucked into a screaming void of strain. 

" You guys go ahead with your warped curriculum fucking reverse psychology bullshit but I am. _Not_. Helping you do it. Fixing Jay doesn't mean destroying what tiny progress we've made."

" We've gotten nowhere, you jackass." Stephanie snapped back, temper boiling over long-lasting patience. 

" This way we're doing something other than telling him words he doesn't understand. Do you think Sionis made him memorize what 'I love you' means?" 

" What I've got in mind, Stephanie," Dick's eyes glittered with coldness, like a sparkling duality of jet stones. " Doesn't involve I love yous." He didn't give any of them the chance to engage in further argument or even give a reply, he left, left with his footfalls banging against the ground like he had a personal grudge against it. His fists were balled tight, teeth chipping they grit so hard, and every muscle on his face, no matter how small, hellbent on twisting into a glower with no compare on earth or hell. 

They were wrong. They were all wrong. Roy abandoned ship, Roy who might have agreed with Dick on this, so it was up to him and him alone to fix Jason before they got the chance to put their destructive, counter-productive plan into motion.

Jason was scared, so all he needed to do was show Jason that once and for all, there was nothing left for him to fear. He'd made sure there was _no one_ left to fear.  


 

Jason almost went into cardiac arrest when the phone was shoved into his face, screen coming to a  halt inches from where it would have hit him and left behind a remarkable bruise. Perplexed, he blinked slowly, then looked up at Dick in a way that fully expressed his confusion. 

" Wh - what i - _ss_ this?"

The mattress creaked when Dick's weight was added to it, he sat next to Jason, turning the phone on, entering his pin code, and scrolling through his gallery to, and Jason was bold enough to assume this, show him something. Dick's presence didn't alarm Jason too much, or that's what it had to look like. As far as threats went, this particular one was rather low on the list, but still, not someone he could fully trust, especially after recalling so clearly what he both promised and failed to deliver what greatly felt like an eternity ago.

" You're scared, right, Jason?" Dick said, rapidly, almost enthusiastically, going through tens of video clips stored on his phone while he spoke. The way he said it, it made it sound like he was trying to convince Jason of his own fear's existence. It seemed.... somehow wrong. Was it wrong? Jason didn't really know but some part of him was halfway convinced it was somewhat unusual. 

" You don't have to be scared of anyone any more or ever again. Y'know why?" Dick asked and before Jason could get a trembling word in, he had clicked on a video and a white circle spinning on the black screen showed it loading.

" Because I took care of them all." That part he almost whispered, part proud in a twisted sense, and the other part feeling he had to whisper or the ears in the walls would pick it up and repeat it to people he didn't want to know them. Jason was about to muster up his courage and ask who he took care of, when the loading process finally finished and a crush of bent, inhumane noises exploded through the tiny speakers. The footage was dark, too dark to make out exactly what was happening but the drill screeching and screams of excruciation were explanatory enough, they gave Jason a startling fright he wasn't prepared for and before he'd even made sense of what was going on, his heart was slamming against his ribcage and cold sweat broke out across his palms because that _sound_ when it met its mark and burrowed so deep into flesh that it became muffled by it..... 

_The sharp, maliciously twisting bit whirred to life and spun. It came closer to Jason, the head pressing into his shoulder just enough to wear away his suit._

_He could already predict how the sharp metal bit would feel when it drilled into his body. Pain exploding, muscles shredded, blood gushing, bone tunnelled into._

_God, he could feel it, taste it, see it._

Jason jerked back, away from the phone Dick presented and right into the wall, _thud_ , his back collided with it but the burst of pain went by him entirely. His chest felt so tight, throat constricting until he thought it would collapse in on itself, he dragged in insufficient sips of air, eyes wide and seeing something that wasn't there when Dick snapped his fingers in his face, trying to break him out of _it_ when in his head, all the rogues were around him again, laughing and applauding, each one screaming out their desire to break him down. He whimpered and shut his eyes against what was being broadcasted in his brain, so that did him a zero sum of good. He still saw it, was still _there_.

" Jason! Jason, it's okay, I killed him. Sionis can't hurt you anymore." Dick urged because surely, in a clip showing Sionis being butchered, Sionis' presence is what hit his brother so hard that it was as if an omnipotent deity had struck the blow. Sionis being there must have triggered traumatic flashes of all the things he had done. As penance, Dick quickly came off that particular video and clicked on another, a different subject but just as satisfying for Jason, who had always been revenge thirsty. 

Shaking, mumbling incoherencies, Jason had curled up but Dick managed to get his hand beneath his chin enough to lift his head and _make_ him look the next horror he showed and saw no wrong behind. He subjected Jason's fragile mindstate to witnessing first hand how much blood had gushed down Zsasz's ghost-white and scarred body when Dick had sawed him down the middle, all the while the masochistic madman laughed for pleasure and sick joy. Crimson flowed down in wild waves, spread across the floor, bone being halved and tissues and sinews grinding and crunching as the jagged teeth of the saw glid through it all.

Fingers cut off, words carved into his back, the burning and wet slaps of his dead skin hitting the ground, Joker dressed as Batman laughing above it all, it all careered into each other, the collision forceful enough to make Jason believe his skull was splitting in two. He screamed but couldn't hear it when all came crashing back down, needle-sharp scraps of memories stabbing into him. It was too much. _Too much!_

" Make it stop, Dick!" He pleaded, thrashing, throwing himself any way that he could without reason. _Bang, thud_ , he didn't know exactly what he was hitting anymore but it was solid and he kept slamming, the pain of it nothing compared to the agonising memories. 

Jaw-agape, at a loss, Dick threw both of his hands onto Jason's shoulders to pin him into the wall, the effort to keep him still one that hurt them both. He pushed Jason into it harder, despite the fact that every one of his breaths came out a scream of unimaginable pain spawned from phantom recollections. 

Then for a hair's breadth, it stopped, the fighting and cries, when Jason froze and his gaze locked with Dick's so hard that it hurt. His eyes were scared teal, scared but for seconds, they were the ones Dick knew. He said something so quiet it was like he mouthed the words and when Dick leaned closer, he heard all too clearly.

_" Please... Help me...."_

Dick's heart stopped and then it was gone, that glimpse of the actual Jason, dragged by force back into the depths when the door flew open and alerted by the ruckus, Bruce, Tim, and Cassandra all burst in with alarm written on all of their features. When they saw Dick pinning a petrified Jason to the wall, all matter of things went through their heads in chorus. 

" Bruce, I-" Dick wasn't given the moment he needed to utter explanation of any sort, rather he was quite forcefully pulled away from Jason by Bruce and Tim shoved him back so that he stumbled. He caught himself just barely and when he did, he saw it, on their faces, in their eyes, _distrust_. 

" What did you do, Dick?" Bruce demanded and there was nothing short of accusation in it. Over his shoulder, Cassandra and Tim tried both in vain to reduce Jason's state but he wasn't listening, rhythmically banging his head against the wall and feverishly shaking while he pleaded with himself or someone invisible. 

" I didn't do-"

Bruce whirled around when Jason wouldn't stop hurting himself even after they burst in. The smacks of his head hitting solid wood were very loud.

" Jason, calm down!" He barked and it didn't take a heartbeat for Jason to respond. He stopped what he was doing and sat straight, inclining his head in an obedient nod.

" Yes. Sorry, sir." Placid as a puppy.

Shouldering past Bruce, Dick snatched up his phone off the bed and bolted out before they had the chance to grill him on what they may be thinking he did and then didn't do. All he did was show Jason something that should have been reassuring for him, convinced him there was no way the rogues were ever laying their hands on him again but he freaked out? _WHY_?! It. Was meant. To make it better. Dick compromised his moral code, went against everything he was ever taught, for Jason and he reacted like he was burned with a hot iron.  Dick didn't understand and it stung like a bitch. 

Not quite sure how, but he knew he'd massively fucked up again and like before, there was no going back.

Another rogue's blood on his hands would cleanse away the stain of this latest sin. 

Dick hadn't realised how and when it had become a perverted cure-all to him.  


 

Bruce didn't go after Dick when he swept out of the room, instead he went to Jason, who Cassandra, bless her, was talking to soothingly, calming him down with a made-up tale of a summer flower or something sounding like that. Tim was looking towards the way Dick had gone but like Bruce, didn't pursue. Whatever damage he had caused here demanded more immediate attention than where he was off to now. 

" Jason," Bruce wanted to say that gently but their new way of treating him denied that, so it came out without emotion. Jason lifted his head in response, all previous signs of terror diminished.

" Sir?"

Inwardly, Bruce winced because he hated the sound of that and he realised their latest method might be harder to go through with than he'd planned. But go through with it they must or they could kiss goodbye to the fantasy of over having their Jason back. 

" What did Dick do?" 

Jason frowned, thinking, trying to remember what exactly set him off in such a fit of chaos when Bruce recalled the only yes/no questions he'd put in place and rephrased. These rules went for everyone, especially him.

" Are you alright?"

" Yes, sir." 

" He didn't hurt you?" 

Jason thought back on what had happened, the video Dick had shown him, what had been on said video, and then it finally registered what he had witnessed. It had looked like his former Sir, being brutally murdered with a drill winding its way through his mid-section..... He'd known Sir was gone, Roy had made that much clear, but he'd done so verbally, not actually shown him the evidence and now it sat heavy as a rock. Sir was dead. Sir was dead. Sir was..... dead.  If he'd not made his peace with it before then now he certainly had to. Roy was gone, Not-Roy had followed, Lian was terrified of him, Sir was gone, what did he have left? Why, his new Sir, of course. The others while had been important, were in the past and if he was focussing on that, how could he adequately serve Sir? He'd been promised death or the white room if he didn't make himself useful and he would do anything to keep from ever going back there. That was where the pain and torture and torment laid. That was where this started and going back would mean something far worse.

To assure Sir, Jason pushed a smile he knew was unconvincing and even for that matter, was pained by it. He didn't know why but fully accepting this new world order pained him. It was as if someone in him didn't want it to be this way, they kept screaming it was wrong, over and over again, pleading with him to remember who he really was, but above it all, trigger words and Sir's commands would always be louder. They would always drown out before-Jason's pleas, whether or not that was what he wanted. 

" No, sir, he didn't hurt me. I feel completely fine."

Lying was bad but in this case, the truth was a ways more so. He was lying because he had to hide the part of him that was very hurt indeed. Hurt meant useless.

_" The day I have no more use for you, Jason, I'll kill you."_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Nance pretty much gave me this ending, so all credit goes to her. Thanks, girl! X. Also, thanks for being patient and reading this far. Can't say when, but I'm planning a sequel at some point with waayy more recovery and would love to see you there :D


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